There was a girl sitting in front of me on the train today. She had longish blonde hair tied in a ponytail and talked constantly on the phone – not one long conversation either, but many smaller ones. I think she smelled of smoke, but it could have been someone else. I don’t think she was feeling well either. She would rest her head against the window as she talked, I believe it was to her mom, and when we passed over the bridge she got a bit freaked and jumped back. She mentioned the bridge on the phone. I’m not sure if it just startled her or whether she has some fear of bridges or water or heights or all of the above.

For some reason I noticed all this through reading Watchmen. Maybe because they were mostly non-visual. I also remember someone eating something very strong-smelling. Not in a bad way, but noticeable. There was a guy across the aisle eating ramen, but I don’t think it was him.

For some reason I wanted to write about this. It’s just odd the multitude of little things you notice throughout the day.

I’ve found professors/TAs/readers are increasingly wanting me to add more detail to my thesis or intro paragraph. I don’t understand this because I actually write decent intro paragraphs and thesis statements. Heck, the fact that I actually know what a thesis statement is and where it’s supposed to go is sadly more than some of the other English majors I’ve come across.

Wanting more detail in the intro paragraph isn’t so bad because I can always add more detail without proving anything. How do you add more detail to a thesis statement without having it become horribly long and complicated though? I don’t know how papers are supposed to be structured these days, but I learned to state my argument in general terms and then go into detail. It’s even more ridiculous when they ask you to start proving things in your intro paragraph. What do they want us to do? Write out the paper before the paper?

So evidently some people (I don’t want to draw conclusions on how many, but I have heard this from multiple sources) were taught in school that a proper concluding paragraph needs to include a broad statement about how the paper’s argument relates to the world at large and/or current events of today.

This confuses me since 95% of the time such a statement will have nothing to do with the rest of your paper.

I have decided that dark chocolate M&Ms are vastly superior to milk chocolate M&Ms. This is because they make the dark chocolate just sweet enough that, when combined with the candy coating, they are neither too dark nor so sweet that they make you get sick of them quickly (as I feel milk chocolate M&Ms have a tendency to do).

This is, of course, my own opinion and not meant to be a statement of fact. I just like making very definitive statements and then ruining it all by writing these wishy washy little notes at the bottom.

Here’s to posting more this year!

….  it’s 6:45 AM, and I’m awake. This is not because I had to get up to use the restroom or had something rudely awaken me. No no, it’s because this has technically become sleeping in for me.

Weird.

Today as I was buying my water at the DC, I overheard one of the employees saying that Aquafina was owned by the Pepsi company. My immediate thought was, “Hm. Maybe I should drink more Pepsi.” I do not know if Aquafina is actually owned by Pepsi. It’s kind of irrelevant. My point is that I would want to support a company that sells water without anything added to it. That probably seems silly until you realize that Dasani, the Coke brand of water, had salt added to it “for flavor.” I think that’s BS. I think they add salt so you’ll get thirsty and buy more water from them.

This sort of thing initially led me to avoid Fiji because they don’t use the standard nutrition label and all I could find on the bottle was that it had extra minerals in it. That sounded suspicious. Forget for a moment that there’s this stuff called mineral water, because I do all the time. Anyway, after more bottle-reading I found out it’s all stuff that naturally filters into the water and that it’s all pretty good for you. I also doubt any of it’s salt since the PH is slightly basic (yay chem knowledge). There’s also the fact that it actually tastes good. I don’t mean I think it tastes good because I like the label, I mean it actually tastes more like nothing than any other water I’ve ever tasted.

This whole thing probably sounds like a commercial, but that’s not the point. The point is that you should be aware of what’s in your water. Especially tap-water. My mom’s a tap-water drinker, and even she is afraid of what’s in the water these days. I’m not saying you need to buy bottled water – just get a filter or something. Knowing is half the battle and all that….

I’ve noticed lately that adults, or young adults at least, seem to have this desire to pretend their teenage years never happened. My creative writing teacher, a graduate student, put it into words when she said that, as an adult, she found it embarrassing to be reminded of how life was like as a teenager because she could no longer relate to the feeling of being one.

I can understand not wanting to dwell on the less glamorous parts of one’s life. Teenagers do stupid things. That’s what being a teenager is about. But all adults were teenagers at some point, and it’s not exactly fair to, once you cross the 18 or 20 or however many years barrier, claim that none of it was real. Just because you’re past it doesn’t mean those struggles and triumphs and emotions weren’t real. They were. They meant something.

And if you forget that, then it’s your loss.

I just realized that the palms of my hands glitter ever so slightly in the light.

I don’t know if they’re supposed to do that, but it’s cool none the less.

So I noticed that in The Jungle Book they draw Kaa differently in his two appearances. The first (his introduction) gives him rounder eyes set farther apart, while the second (Trust In Me) gives him the more recognizable appearance with tall eyes set next to each other. This second style seems to also be more expression-friendly.

This probably isn’t normally that noticeable or particularly important, but I felt like mentioning it because it’s really annoying when you realize the two scenes you’ve been using as a drawing reference don’t match up.

On a separate note, now I’m interested why that is. Do you think they had two separate animation teams do the different scenes, or did one get done later after the style had been more refined?

So I was waiting at the train station yesterday – cold, tired, hungry, and kinda down because I didn’t know when I’d get picked up due to traffic. However, my mood was lifted when I noticed this guy on the next bench was wearing orange and brown sneakers with bright pink shoelaces. I don’t think it’s surprising what song I had stuck in my head after that.

He’s got tan shoes with pink shoelaces
A polka dot vest and man oh man
He’s got tan shoes with pink shoelaces
And a big Panama with a purple hat band!

Good Times.