Anti social media hypocrite (416 words)

Today I hit a semi epiphany- social media is dumb.

                Now I am aware that I most likely should of realized this a long time ago, but hey, at least It’s finally hit me.  Scrolling through my twitter feed and instagram photos lately have left me nothing but upset, and I can’t really explain why other than the fact that teenagers just say really dumb stuff, including myself.

I always wonder what it was like to be in my parents age of growing up where there was not even internet, something I can’t imagine, not because I couldn’t live without it, but because it’s just strange to think about.

As technology advances I’ve realized that social media hits every aspect of our life lately, down to even school 3 of my teachers have twitter accounts specifically for posting things about classes, which to be honest, weird.

Sometimes I feel like the only person who’s against social advances through technology, I kind of hate the fact that I’m able to know everything people are doing, it takes away our interest in each other. It takes away the fact that we no longer have to wonder about each other, were stuck checking up on each other  whether we like it, and then if we decide to avoid it suck as deleting our pages of social media were left feeling left out by our peers because it’s constantly surrounding us.

To me, it’s sad. We no longer have to try to keep in contact with each other, instead of calling, we text. Instead of asking someone how they’re doing, we check their twitter page.  

As a girl, maybe I’m a little bitter because of old cheesy movies where a guy calls a girl to go on a date and ect. Because thanks to social media I believe that doesn’t happen anymore, or at least rarely, which is sad. I know girls still want that stuff because my girlfriends talk about it all the time.

Now there are some cool things that come with social media, I won’t even lie, technology is cool especially when it comes to advancements in the medical field and all that saving lives stuff, and helping people connect. SO from now on, I’ll back up things like Skype that help people video chat and at least talk face to face.

So all in all technology is a cool thing but nothing beats making people wonder what youre doing, or just talking face to face. J

Musics affect on friendships (398 words)

If I haven’t said this in a previous blog before, I think I should make it clear that music is probably my most favorite thing on this earth, and my second favorite is finding people who love it just as much as I do.     

                Many of my friends and other people I’ve talked to I’ve gotten to know through music. What artist they like, what genre, what style, ect. I think it tells a lot about hem as a person.

                The other day I was looking through my messages with some of my best friends and realized how much alike we are in what we listen to, and half of our conversations consist of just sending back and forth links to music or lyric videos with each other.

                Personally I’ve noticed lately that the only people I can really connect to most likely and always have the same music taste as me, which leads me to the point of what you listen to defines you, which I’ve already talked about before. It amazes me.

                I’m thankful to have friends that listen to the kinds of music I do because whenever I’m in different moods I swear they always know what to play or link me no matter if I’m upset, excited, or just wanting to goof around. Did I mention I love it?

                The best part of anything is that although each of us listens to similar music, all of us favor a different artist or song. It seems as though our personalities are defined through our different  liking for different yet similar music.

                Just looking around the hallways at Kennedy I bet you can probably tell what kind of media or music someone is interested in just by how they represent themselves.

I feel like people don’t realize how much the music they listen to affects their relationships with people because if you think about it, music is everywhere constantly giving advice. So now I’m going to end this wonderful blog with a quote from my favorite & the late babe, “One good thing about music, when it hits you, you feel no pain.” –Bob Marley

Underrated: B.o.B (475 words)

B.o.B, has become one of the country's biggest pop superstars. With songs in his past that included Bruno Mars and Eminem, his success was pretty much inevitable. The debut album, B.o.B Presents: The Adventures of Bobby Ray, went on to sell over 500,000 copies with its singles exceeding over 8 million in sales.

However, what really cemented him into the limelight was the quadruple-platinum smash, "Airplanes," featuring Paramore's Hayley Williams. The song was unavoidable, and even when its buzz died down, B.o.B's didn't. That fall, he dropped the critically acclaimed mixtape, No Genre, as well as another the following year, E.P.I.C.; the mixtapes showed a promising direction for B.o.B's follow-up to Adventures. The result, Strange Clouds, will easily rake in the awards like its predecessor, but hardly for the reasons that made B.o.B worth being excited about to begin with.

Album opener "Bombs Away" starts off brilliantly with a Morgan Freeman intro, but that's all the track has going for it as it fails to capitalize on its beginning with any sort of similar excitement. Even the record's first single and title song strays away from what B.o.B normally offers with its awkward dubstep elements, a boring chorus, and a forced Lil Wayne cameo.

Strange Clouds continues to take more risks with Nicki Minaj bringing her batshit insanity in the worst ways to the frantic upbeat "Out of My Mind," but Taylor Swift comes in with the knockout on the mid-tempo ballad "Both of Us" -- a track that will easily crush the success of "Airplanes" on the charts. Additionally, other flaws exist within the record vocally as they don't feel nearly as explosive as they have in the past. The one constant that B.o.B has managed to maintain on not only this album, but throughout his entire career, is the production. Dr. Luke, Cirkut, and Ryan Tedder are among the plethora of producers that lay down their touch on select numbers, and it's a nice distraction when the songs don't live up to its highest substance. The only problem is ... that occurs way too often

The flow of Strange Clouds tends to vary between songs that are helping make the album great ("So Good," "Arena," "So Hard to Breathe"), and then the ones that keep pushing it down the route of a sophomore slump ("Ray Bands," "Just a Sign," "Play for Keeps"). Right when there's about to be a trend of some consistency, it ends up falling short. The charm within 2010's Adventures took place in the fact that whatever B.o.B was doing on it -- whether it was a ballad, club banger, or just blending a bunch of genres in one -- it seemed to be done effortlessly. With Strange Clouds, the vision just seems blurry, and hopefully he can recapture the magic on a future record.

Discovery: Death apps. (405 words)

The other day while searching the iTunes app store I discovered a trend you maybe wouldn't have expected to take off: apps that tell you how soon you and your loved ones will likely die. Something I wasn’t sure if I should look into considering how superstitious I already am. But I took a slight risk and decided to look more into it.

As far as I can tell, it started earlier this year with the website See Your Folks. If your parents are still alive, See Your Folks predicts how many more times you’re likely to see them. It makes its predictions using World Health Organization data combined with the number of times you see them per year. 

But that's just your loved ones. Me, being a bit more self-centered than the usual person wanted to see if there were any apps that would tell me the big question “When will I die?”. It's a new watch currently being kickstarted. Tikker tells you how many years, days, hours and minutes you likely have left in your life. Still a bit scared of these strange new apps.

As I looked into these more I realized, I have a soft spot in my heart for this kind of thing. I'm a sucker for an old-fashioned appeal to death. I also like the promise that they try to make - that we should keep thinking about death as a way to live our lives better. Of course, the concept of these death clocks’ existence is probably nearly as effective as owning one. If you put anything in front of your face for long enough, you’ll learn to ignore it. Even the tick-tock of your own march toward the grave.

            The reason I think these apps appeal so much to a person is because they are answering the one question no one has really ever been able to answer. And of course with these apps comes a lot of speculation, even myself wondering how they know, even with data backing it up, I’ll always question it, and I think other people should too.

            A rule I think people need to keep in mind is to never let one app or any technology control how you live your life. Because that can always become a very scary thing, and also, you want to live your life, right? I mean, I know I do so I hope others the same.

A connection (427 words)

I swear music is the only that keeps me really sane. No matter what mood I’m in music fits. To me that’s kind of weird how music is literally an everyday thing for billions of people even though it’s constantly overlooked especially by myself it still amazes me so much.

And isn’t it weird how if you’re a certain emotion you tend to listen to a certain type of music, I wonder if I’m the only one who is amazed by this.

My favorite music app is 8 tracks, the reason I even noticed the emotional connection with music that has amazed me so much, because when you go onto 8 tracks, their playlists are in order by emotion or tag you click on, so I could click on the tag sad and it will usually take me to a playlist full of songs other people listen to when they’re sad and usually, I like the songs when I’m sad.\

I feel like the beat is the main connection to our emotions in songs. Because if you’re sad you’re probably a bit tired and not wanting a lot of loud noises blasting through your ear pissing you off anymore or a little kid song playing talking to you about how to do something like wash your hands, (I don’t even know where that came from but I know it’s probably not something you’d want to hear if you’re almost an adult and are sad, but then again, I don’t really know who you are so if that’s what you like to listen to when you’re sad… that’s cool)you’d probably want to listen to something slow to most likely calm your mind because I think that’s what studies show.. I’m not a doctor, I should probably remind you.

If I’m happy I usually find myself listening to everything but slow. It’s so crazy how much our minds switch between emotions. Like if a upbeat song is playing 9 times out of 10 I’m probably not even listening to the lyrics or the real meaning of the song, but if I listen to it when I’m sad I hate it because the lyrics don’t fit exactly what I’m going through, therefore my grumpy self will most likely want nothing to do with it.

I’d like to think I’m not the only teenager who feels this way considering how many teenagers and even adults connect to music and have their life revolve around it.

So in general, what I’m saying is that the way music connects to emotions is cool.

The ultimate distraction (402 words)

Right now I am currently having a real tough time typing my blog, given it is a Sunday, but I am so incredibly tired that nothing, and I mean nothing creative is flowing out of my brain, and the internet is not helping one bit.

First off, for some odd reason I cannot stop checking twitter because I’m a typical white girl who’s really interested with what other people are doing in their lives right now even though I should probably consider looking at my not even close to being done chem worksheet and also, my not even close to done math worksheet, both which I have no idea how to do.

                And of course I’m online shopping right now, completely ignoring all other things because Urban Outiftters and Free people know best. They know that fashion is more important than knowing life skills and getting good grades, they also know that if I don’t online shop I will look like a complete loser in front of all my friends who’s opinions seriously matter.

                Currently, my kitten is trying to type on my laptop and is being uber cute distracting me once again. Butttttttt, my kitten is so much more important than this blog and deserves all my attention, even though this blog counts as a grade and has an effect on my future, the cat is cuter therefore the cat wins my attention.. so this is awkward for my teacher reading this…

                If it counts for media, I’m currently scrolling through Youtube finding songs to put on my ipod that I’ll listen to at school tomorrow so I can ignore all the core reasons I’m there and drowned out all the people I dislike at the place that I hate and offers me nothing (school).

                At this point I still have 100 words left and am not sure what to do with them.

But I digress……………….. Media is controlling my lazy Sunday and I think I’m about to just let it. Yes, I know this is not the wise thing to do but my mind is shutting down along with about over 100 of the students I know so I’m deciding to be an extra typical teenager to day and go with the flow, I’m sure my rebellion self will probably be angry in a while when I’m still working but then maybe the caffeine will kick in, wish me luck…

Anti-radio (402 words)

The song lost in translation by G-eazy has officially opened up a new want of mine. In one of the songs he said “On a flight to japan, where the culture is doper.” See, I’d never really thought about a vacation to Japan, but after hearing the song, I did a little research.

 

            After doing some research I actually realized Japan is a lot like the United States but in a very different way. Its culture is so diverse. I’ve never been actually educated by a rap song before so this of course is a big first.

 

            Ever since then I’ve started to listen to the lyrics of more of my songs more, and I’ve actually had to on top of adding music to my phone, delete some because of how much I hate it. It kind of surprised me but at the same time didn’t how seriously stupid some peoples lyrics are, especially rappers.

 

            Of course there are still some songs to listen to just for fun even though they are horrible lyrically they still have a good beat, like all of most pop stars music.

 

            I don’t know if you’ve ever really listened to the music they play on Z102.9 but it really is crap. Like none of the songs have that much of a meaning plus are mainly auto tuned and are probably teaching people what exactly not to do in life, minus a few. Kind of pisses me off to realize that mainstream music is putting crap into people’s minds.

 

            So I recommend that if you don’t want your brain full of crap, avoid the radio. Most of it is songs brought back from old times just changed to fit what people like to hear which is not what real music is. Music is an art that real musicians use to express their feelings with.

 

            I can’t even imagine what goes through artist who aren’t main stream wonder about while they’re listening to the radio, I bet many of them become just as angry as myself. It makes me want to walk into the radio station and complain to somebody but I realize that this is a bigger problem that doesn’t just start in the local radio.

 

            So, in conclusion, my lesson here is don’t listen to the radio. It is becoming anti real music, and its poorly writer by large music companies focused on grabbing peoples attention. It’s all about the money.

What a picture is really worth (401 words)

Since I usually am constantly talking about music in almost every post of mine, I thought I’d do a bit of a throwback Thursday. The reason for this is because the other day I was looking through all of my old photos my mom has saved throughout the years. While going through them I quickly became emotional, even while looking at happy pictures. So…. I started to wonder..

           

            They say that a picture is worth a thousand words but if you think about it, those worse are truly unsaid. If you’re confused already, this is what I mean: The quote “A picture is worth a thousand words” purely defines a picture, millions of them. I mean, if you think about it, doesn’t that really just cover it? A picture is actually worth about 7 words based off a quote, based off of emotions.

 

            Although I don’t think memories can be described by words I think it all depends on the person. If a person looks at a certain picture and becomes angry, I guarantee you there are more than just words behind that picture. Many that cannot be described.

 

            Where I’m going with this blog is that a picture cannot be described by words at all and it is one of the most frustrating things to hear as a aspiring photographer, because that mean memories are being judged in your head by feels not by the beauty of a visually stunning photo or how you felt when the photo was taken. A photo is about the moment, moments cannot be completely described by words and I beg people never do that.

 

            Now, I understand the quote is just saying that you can’t express all your emotions for one photo in a couple of words, and I understand that, but where it goes wrong is key. The quote is expecting people to just accept the fact that they can’t describe a photo all in a couple thoughts, but I believe this isn’t true. I believe thoughts create emotions and emotions create thoughts all which come together to create one, not just a thousand or so.

 

            Once all thoughts come together I believe that it creates the words, which are the or at least should be the last part of your thought process, that is when you are ready to tell what a photo is really worth.. but then again…is that really possible?