"Talking of Michelangelo"

 

As I read, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, by T. S. Eliot, I couldn't help but think about how much it relates to our topic of study: Modernism.

Contagious

So last night I was in the "No Shhh" Zone of the HBLL with some friends studying.

All of a sudden, a guy a few feet away at a computer started laughing. For the first few moments, no one paid much attention. But after about 3 minutes, people started noticing. Note: it was not any normal "ha ha ha" it was hysterical wheezing like "hee hee hee haw haw haw!"
After about 5 minutes, EVERYONE in the library was looking at this guy and laughing along. No one was really sure but his laugh was so contagious that no one could help but laugh too. It was probably one of the best moments of my life. Everyone was in hysterics laughing along with this guy even though they had no clue what he was laughing about. Although almost no one knew each other, we all joined together through laughter.

My friend and I were sitting in a spot where we could see what was on his screen.
What was he dying of laughter from?

4 Stars

 The Marriage of Heaven and Hell

by: William Blake

I decided to post book reviews on both Shelfari and Amazon

I gave the book 4 stars because while it was an entertaining read, I found myself only reading the words and not actually taking in the information because I couldn't follow what Blake was trying to say.
The 4 stars are merely personal belief, not because of the content or it is poorly written.

I would recommend this book to anyone, religious or not. It is an entertaining and humorous read. Blake's Proverbs of Hell are widely known and after reading them, it is easy to understand why.

It honestly took me about 30 minutes to read it through the first time. Of course you would have to read much more in-depth to understand the content but it is worth it.

I decided I would also load my create photo project pictures into an album on Facebook for others to see.
Link here: TO FACEBOOK AND AWAY!

Prezi is Messy

So at 10:05 pm October 19, 2010, I finally finished my photo project for my create project about my book.
It took me awhile to get the hang of things with all the different frames and fun ways for the path to go. I finally got going at a steady pace about a hour later.  

At 11:53 am October 19, 2010, Prezi decided that it would stop loading my pictures and just break down on me.
I'm pretty sure I almost broke down into a tired, stressed ball of frustration on the floor.
For about half a hour, I tried to fix what was wrong and get everything going again but it just wouldn't work.
I gave up and went to my former tool (and successful) of presentations - Microsoft PowerPoint

Although I agree that we all need to embrace the future of technology, but I will NOT be using Prezi again.
Too much hassle.
I'm happy with my Microsoft Office.

Thus ends my modest rant.
If I had written this a hour ago, the entire post would be in CAPITAL letters and there would be exaggerations to the errors of Prezi.

The Marriage of Heaven and Hell

The book our group chose to read was The Marriage of Heaven and Hell by William Blake. It was originally published through "illuminated printing" which was using etched copper plates to print pages that were then colored by hand. Only 9 copies are known to exist.
This book is satirical in nature and was actually entertaining to read his thoughts on religion and morality.
My favorite, and what Blake is best known for, is his "Proverbs of Hell" which contain 70 axioms.

The short book follows the theme of

"Good is the passive that obeys Reason. Evil is the active springing from Energy."

Blake satirically mocks ancient prophets, apostles, and even Jesus Christ but not to discredit them. It adds humor to religion and supports his view that "for every thing that lives is Holy."

 

I made a Wordle with the Proverbs of Hell section of the book. As seen, some of the most recurring things are God and man. Blake's 70 axioms are both humorous and good principles to follow.

I created a Microsoft PowerPoint of my 9 favorite and what I believe to encompass the entire book's message. [I then uploaded the PowerPoint to slideshare and it took away all my fun custom animations. bummer]

Proverbs of Hell: Shuanified

View more presentations from shuan8pai.

The Great Debate

The question that has haunted this Earth for centuries...

What 'd Ya Say?

So I'm sure many people have used language translators before but the best one that I've used is Google Translator.

I'm currently mentoring an 8th grader boy who only speaks Mandarin. Although I have grown up speaking Mandarin in my home, I can not compare to someone that has lived in China their entire life until very recently. I'm helping him in history since he cannot read English and does not understand what his teacher says.
There are a few words that I was unable to translate, but I headed straight to Google translate and he understood immediately after just typing a word or phrase in.

It really is amazing how quickly, efficiently, and, most importantly, correctly online translators are becoming.

As I showed Ching, the 8th grader, how to go about using Google translate, he realized this would help him greatly when trying to read any of his lessons. He is a brilliant kid and only lacks in the knowledge of the English language.

There are 48 languages available for users to translate. With a wide variety, anyone in the world can use Google Translate with ease. You can even translate websites! This tool is extremely useful and I've used it many times throughout the years and have seen how it has changed and evolved to what it is today.

Another reason Google is supreme over Yahoo.

Chained To A Tree

Open the Box

I have recently discovered Pandora radio. It is an internet radio that allows the user to type in an artist or song or genre she likes and it will generate a radio station with songs that are related to what was typed in.

Above is a screen-shot of my current radio station. I originally typed in Michael Buble and it generated other songs that it thought I would enjoy such as "Brown Eyed Girl".
The idea of Pandora internet radio was to create an in-depth analysis of music and bring together songs not by their titled genre but by what the songs sound like themselves. They call it The Music Genome Project®.
What I also love about Pandora is that you don't HAVE to listen to what they give you. You can always change it to a different song that you'd like to listen to just by searching for it.

I introduced this internet radio to my roommate Katie and she absolutely loved it. She likes to listen to "oldies" and she didn't like listening to the radio before since she couldn't find stations that played music she liked. Now, she just types in whatever she likes into Pandora and she's got a great list of music she enjoys listening to.

Pandora gives me much joy. Instead of having to find songs I like on Youtube or listening to my small playlist of music I'm in the mood for, Pandora does it all for me. It's great! I highly recommend Pandora to everyone

Mini-Book Club Book List

For my book list, I tried to look for books about a specific person or event that was included in the historical periods provided. Personally, I learn and understand history better when I'm following a story through that period.

Uprising by Margaret Peterson Haddix [Historical Fiction]

 In the spirit of my last blog post, this book follows 3 girls whom lives' were tied to the Triangle Factory. These 3 best friends come from different backgrounds but all are fighting for rights for the women working in the factory. It includes the horrible working and living conditions. This book documents the working girl's life and what occurred the day of the Triangle Factory Fire.

The Kingdom of Matthias: A Story of Sex and Salvation in 19th Century America by: Paul E. Johnson & Sean Wilentz [Non-Fiction]

I almost scratched this book off just because of the title, but then I started reading the description and reviews. It follows Matthias the Prophet and his influence in 19th Century America. It documents the Second Great Awakening and includes some detail about the rise of new sects during this movement (such as the LDS church). This book basically follows a cult leader's journey and experience. (Side note to my book club pals: I'm leaning toward this book)

The Great Labor Uprising of 1877  by Philip S. Foner [Non-Fiction]

This book is about the Railroad Strike of 1877 when railroad workers in Martinsburg, West Virginia walked off the job to protest a 10% cut in their wages. This strike scaled upward to violence. It is an interesting and detailed account of the strike and how it affected America. 

Iron in Her Soul: Elizabeth Gurley Flynn and the American Left by Helen C. Camp [Biography]

Follows the life of Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, a hardcore labor movement activist. She helped organize many labor unions. She also joined the American Communist Party and became a chair in the party.

The Girls

During the course of the Industrial Revolution, many events and inventions changed the world. The cotton gin improved the process of collecting and separating cotton. Interchangeable parts made items such as machines much more easy to assemble and fix. The shift from agriculture to the factory system caused a great population shift from the country to cities. 

With the need of more factory workers, women became a driving force in the working society. Lowell Mills, which began in 1814, employed girls from the ages of 13 - 30. Other such mills started appearing elsewhere in the United States. Many of the girls that left home to work in these mills were forced to by family's money situation.Working conditions were hard. There were usually about 80 girls and machines packed into a room. It was hot and humid in the rooms and they were often never ventilated so girls would faint from the heat and bad air. The hours were long and grueling. Typically 12 to 14 hours was a normal work day. They were often not allowed many or sometimes any breaks. In Certification Woman's blog post about the Lowell Mills, she posted a typical work day schedule:

4:30 a.m. Wake up call
5:00 a.m. Work began
7:00 a.m. Breakfast
7:30 a.m. Back to work
12:30 p.m. Dinner
1:00 p.m. Work resumed
7:00 p.m. Workday ended
10:00 p.m. Lights out

 

 Many deaths occurred from the terrible working conditions. One tragedy that occurred and helped change working conditions and safety regulations was the Triangle Factory Fire.
March 25, 1911, near closing time, a fire broke out at the top levels of the factory. Many workers were of course women. Many factors came in when determining why 146 of the 500 employees died.
- The doors were locked to the rooms where the girls worked so many died trapped inside.
- The doors all opened inward so the crowd of oncoming girls did not allow for the doors to open.
- The one fire escape collapsed
- There fire safety was only 27 buckets of water.

Many girls leapt 9 stories to their death. It was said that onlookers watched as girls would jump from the top levels and hit the ground with a thud.                                

 

 It is such a horrible event and it is even more terrible to think that so many young lives had to be ended for better working conditions to be put into place. So many of those deaths and other such work-related deaths could have been prevented if the simple thought of humanity was there.

   

Dii would like to GO!

So I've decided to make this Digital Lab post on Diigo since it was a totally new web tool to me.
Here's a video that diigo has to introduce you to it's website.


Diigo V5: Collect and Highlight, Then Remember! from diigobuzz on Vimeo.

Diigo allows us to bookmark, highlight, and add sticky notes to any web page. Because all this information is added to the 'cloud' , it allows us to access the web pages we have bookmarked AND it will still contain all the highlights/sticky notes added.
I have found this comes in mighty useful when doing research and I need to keep tabs on what sources I have visited.
Personal Example:
I have a paper for my Book of Mormon class that needs educational sources. As I have searched throughout the web for these sources, I've found that rather having 50 different tabs open, I can just bookmark them to diigo and life is MUCH simpler.
I introduced Diigo to my roommate, Katie. She was very excited when I told her about how she could keep all of her web pages bookmarked and could go back to them later. Like me, she had always kept multiple tabs open to remember her sources. It has completely changed both of our methods at source tracking.
I must say, Diigo is an AMAZING tool. I didn't think I'd be using it much, but I have found that it keeps things much more organized.
So, go Diigo go!