New Blog, New Style!
Come check out my newest blog at:
http://thecaligarmo.wordpress.com
I changed basically cause I'm sick of blogger.
-Aram the Garmo
See you over there!
Thursday, August 21, 2008
Monday, August 18, 2008
Quick Post
Hey everyone!
So I know I have been very very bad with posting very recently, but I SWEAR that I have been EXTREMELY busy with life and everything. I am also creating a new space for my blog since blogger is not allowing me the functionality that I need for my blog. It also forces me to accept 3rd party cookies which I really don't want. So I promise that sometime this week I will get my blog up and running and have my first post on or before next Monday.
Until then,
-Aram the Garmo
So I know I have been very very bad with posting very recently, but I SWEAR that I have been EXTREMELY busy with life and everything. I am also creating a new space for my blog since blogger is not allowing me the functionality that I need for my blog. It also forces me to accept 3rd party cookies which I really don't want. So I promise that sometime this week I will get my blog up and running and have my first post on or before next Monday.
Until then,
-Aram the Garmo
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
A slow evolution
The day that my blog will be ready for the public is nearing. There is only 18 days before my blog will start to become more consistent. If you've been with me since the beginning you have probably already started to see a difference in my blog. I am talking less about random philosophical stuff and am relating more towards my audience. This was put into place by allowing people to vote. (If you want to vote on what my blog will be like, there is a voting box on the right side of my page. Votes will be stopped in 18 days.) I've also changed the look of my blog and also the name of my blog. I also recently changed my URL to: http://thecaligarmo.blogspot.com (Sorry if this confused anyone.)
There have also been some behind the scene changes that haven't appeared on my blog, but has happened in the infrastructure of my workings. I've created a new email address (This brings my total up to 6) and also have changed my twitter name to better suit all of my changes. There are also more changes on the way that will allow me to separate this blog from my daily workings so that I can blog better. This has been a very fun and exciting time for me so I hope you are all ready to begin the fabulous journey with me when the time comes in August.
Also, if there are any changes that you dislike or if you would like to see some changes added please let me know!
Excitedly,
-Aram the Garmo
There have also been some behind the scene changes that haven't appeared on my blog, but has happened in the infrastructure of my workings. I've created a new email address (This brings my total up to 6) and also have changed my twitter name to better suit all of my changes. There are also more changes on the way that will allow me to separate this blog from my daily workings so that I can blog better. This has been a very fun and exciting time for me so I hope you are all ready to begin the fabulous journey with me when the time comes in August.
Also, if there are any changes that you dislike or if you would like to see some changes added please let me know!
Excitedly,
-Aram the Garmo
Thursday, July 17, 2008
South Carolina, Gay?
Now who would have ever thought a story like this would develop? An Australian based gay travel company has labeled South Carolina among 5 other locations in the U.S. as 'great destinations' for the gay traveler. This makes me wonder whether Amro Worldwide did any research before starting their advertising campaign for South Carolina as being 'so gay.'
Amro Worldwide basically started an advertising campaign in London during London's pride in order to promote gay destinations in the U.S. South Carolina, Boston, Washington D.C., Atlanta, New Orleans, and Las Vegas were all chosen to be a part of their poster campaign in which posters describing each city as 'so gay' were put around the London Underground. The South Carolina poster is depicted on the left. But with South Carolina being so politically conservative and having such a anti-gay stance you would wonder how such a thing could happen. Don't we remember how South Carolina was the place where Irmo High School's principal resigned from his high school just because he did not want a gay-straight alliance starting up? So let's see how all of this went down.
The weird part is that it turns out that South Carolina originally liked the 'so gay' idea. Kristy Dillury, who is the spokesgirl for South Carolina Tourism, said "South Carolina has a lot to offer gay travellers... We are delighted to be involved with the 'so gay' campaign in particular as it sends a powerful positive message to everyone that there is nothing wrong at all with a destination being described as 'so gay'." This was put on a press release [here]. From here the advertising poster campaign was begun. It all went downhill once The Palmetto Scoop, a blog from South Carolina, talked about the ad campaign that Amro was putting up [found here]. Apparently Republican state senator David Thomas protested against the campaign and wanted an audit of the tourism department to see how this campaign could have happened using South Carolina's tax payer's money. The audit turned out that a lower level employee allowed the poster campaign to go through and the $5,000 to be paid for the ads without ever talking to their supervisor. Of course this employee quietly resigned. The governor of South Carolina, who apparently is in the running for VP of John McCain, said that the poster campaign was 'inappropriate.'
You can find the whole article [here].
All of this played out pretty much the way anyone could have imagined. I wish that South Carolina was not so anti-gay, but it's one state at a time I guess. I just have one question for Amro Worldwide. Why is San Francisco not on your list of 'great destinations'? And maybe next time, they should do some research before starting and ad campaign.
Realistically,
-Aram the Garmo
Amro Worldwide basically started an advertising campaign in London during London's pride in order to promote gay destinations in the U.S. South Carolina, Boston, Washington D.C., Atlanta, New Orleans, and Las Vegas were all chosen to be a part of their poster campaign in which posters describing each city as 'so gay' were put around the London Underground. The South Carolina poster is depicted on the left. But with South Carolina being so politically conservative and having such a anti-gay stance you would wonder how such a thing could happen. Don't we remember how South Carolina was the place where Irmo High School's principal resigned from his high school just because he did not want a gay-straight alliance starting up? So let's see how all of this went down.The weird part is that it turns out that South Carolina originally liked the 'so gay' idea. Kristy Dillury, who is the spokesgirl for South Carolina Tourism, said "South Carolina has a lot to offer gay travellers... We are delighted to be involved with the 'so gay' campaign in particular as it sends a powerful positive message to everyone that there is nothing wrong at all with a destination being described as 'so gay'." This was put on a press release [here]. From here the advertising poster campaign was begun. It all went downhill once The Palmetto Scoop, a blog from South Carolina, talked about the ad campaign that Amro was putting up [found here]. Apparently Republican state senator David Thomas protested against the campaign and wanted an audit of the tourism department to see how this campaign could have happened using South Carolina's tax payer's money. The audit turned out that a lower level employee allowed the poster campaign to go through and the $5,000 to be paid for the ads without ever talking to their supervisor. Of course this employee quietly resigned. The governor of South Carolina, who apparently is in the running for VP of John McCain, said that the poster campaign was 'inappropriate.'
You can find the whole article [here].
All of this played out pretty much the way anyone could have imagined. I wish that South Carolina was not so anti-gay, but it's one state at a time I guess. I just have one question for Amro Worldwide. Why is San Francisco not on your list of 'great destinations'? And maybe next time, they should do some research before starting and ad campaign.
Realistically,
-Aram the Garmo
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Cancun Part 2
First off, sorry for not updating yesterday; I wasn't really in the writing mood persay. So anyway, today I will be going into the Mayan ruins that surround Cancun, and also my gay clubbing experience.
First I'll start off with the Mayan ruins around Cancun. Of course when you go to Cancun you have to visit the historical sites of the Mayan civilization. Each location has so much information and beauty that it will be impossible for me to explain all of it here, but I will try as much as I can. I highly recommend everyone to go and visit at least once in your lives.
So the first place we went to was Chichen Itza. Chichen Itza is the most easily recognizable city developed by the Mayans. Chichen Itza has the largest games arena out of all the other spots. The Mayans used to play a game where they would hit a ball with a bat trying to get the ball into a hole on a wall around 20 feet up. (I really wish I had my pics so I can show you!) The cool part about this game was that every year they would have a sort of tournament in which each team would try and beat all the others. The team that ends up winning the tournament goes down in their history in a very simple way. The captain of the team would be sacrificed to their gods. Now a cool thing I learned was that human sacrifice did not come to the Mayans until the Tulocs came to their towns and basically 'conquered' them. So winning this game was one of the few ways to be have an honorable sacrifice. Normally a human sacrifice was reserved for their enemies. Thank God I wasn't their enemies!
Another cool point about Chichen Itza is their main structure. The building used to house the ruler of the city and was pretty massive. It also had a lot of significance which mainly corresponded to the Mayan Calendar. The Mayan calendar was pretty cool. It actually consisted of 2 different calendars that corresponded perfectly to predict eclipses. They had a lunar calendar which lasted 260 days. It was 13 months of 20 days each. The cool thing is that the 260 days corresponds to the womens reproduction cycle. If you notice 260 days is approximately how long it takes for a baby to be born, from inception to birth. Their second calendar was the lunar calendar which contained 365 days. This was 19 months of 20 days and 1 month with 5 days in it. The cool part is that the reason this last month only has 5 days in it is because it is seen as a bad month. The reason it is seen as bad is because it is the only 5 days out of the whole year that Venus cannot be seen from their point of view. And every 52 years the 2 cycles coincide. When they coincide is when an eclipse happens. Pretty cool!
Some other cool parts of Chichen Itza I will leave to you to find out when you go and visit yourself. I'll also mention that the entire place just looks absolutely beautiful. The concept that they were able to create all of these structures without the use of a wheel is amazing. I know that they egyptians did the same with the pyramids, but it still is amazing that humans could actually achieve such amazing feats. We also went to Tulum which was very beautiful also. Tulum was very cool mainly because you were able to see the buildings up close. There wasn't much information given to us at Tulum.
So the last thing I want to discuss is my gay clubbing experience down there. On the last night there I went to the gay club called 'Karamba.' The cool part is that it was in the city center itself. As in it wasn't anywhere near any of the hotels. Another cool part was that it was their comedy night and so they had a drag queen telling jokes all night long. I understood none of it, but it was pretty cool to be able to watch the whole thing happening. The music was also amazing and the hospitality there was great. I went there on my own of course and within 30 minutes a group of locals invited me to join their group and we hang out the whole time. They spoke really good English so my horrible Spanish was not used very much. The music at the club was also really good. There were only 2 problems the whole night. 1) There wasn't too much dancing happening. Of course I ended up dancing, but that's just the type of guy I am. 2) One of my drinks got spiked. Now this was mainly my fault and luckily nothing happened, but it was still a little worrisome.
So that is my experience in Cancun. I really enjoyed every minute and hope that one day I am able to go back during their amazing spring break time. I can only imagine how crazy and full that whole place is when it is packed with college students. I also realized that I need to work on my Spanish a lot, but that my Spanish is decent enough to get me by. I was able to have a whole conversation with the taxi driver on the way to the club. That's got to amount to something right!
Ravishingly,
-Aram the Garmo
First I'll start off with the Mayan ruins around Cancun. Of course when you go to Cancun you have to visit the historical sites of the Mayan civilization. Each location has so much information and beauty that it will be impossible for me to explain all of it here, but I will try as much as I can. I highly recommend everyone to go and visit at least once in your lives.
So the first place we went to was Chichen Itza. Chichen Itza is the most easily recognizable city developed by the Mayans. Chichen Itza has the largest games arena out of all the other spots. The Mayans used to play a game where they would hit a ball with a bat trying to get the ball into a hole on a wall around 20 feet up. (I really wish I had my pics so I can show you!) The cool part about this game was that every year they would have a sort of tournament in which each team would try and beat all the others. The team that ends up winning the tournament goes down in their history in a very simple way. The captain of the team would be sacrificed to their gods. Now a cool thing I learned was that human sacrifice did not come to the Mayans until the Tulocs came to their towns and basically 'conquered' them. So winning this game was one of the few ways to be have an honorable sacrifice. Normally a human sacrifice was reserved for their enemies. Thank God I wasn't their enemies!
Another cool point about Chichen Itza is their main structure. The building used to house the ruler of the city and was pretty massive. It also had a lot of significance which mainly corresponded to the Mayan Calendar. The Mayan calendar was pretty cool. It actually consisted of 2 different calendars that corresponded perfectly to predict eclipses. They had a lunar calendar which lasted 260 days. It was 13 months of 20 days each. The cool thing is that the 260 days corresponds to the womens reproduction cycle. If you notice 260 days is approximately how long it takes for a baby to be born, from inception to birth. Their second calendar was the lunar calendar which contained 365 days. This was 19 months of 20 days and 1 month with 5 days in it. The cool part is that the reason this last month only has 5 days in it is because it is seen as a bad month. The reason it is seen as bad is because it is the only 5 days out of the whole year that Venus cannot be seen from their point of view. And every 52 years the 2 cycles coincide. When they coincide is when an eclipse happens. Pretty cool!
Some other cool parts of Chichen Itza I will leave to you to find out when you go and visit yourself. I'll also mention that the entire place just looks absolutely beautiful. The concept that they were able to create all of these structures without the use of a wheel is amazing. I know that they egyptians did the same with the pyramids, but it still is amazing that humans could actually achieve such amazing feats. We also went to Tulum which was very beautiful also. Tulum was very cool mainly because you were able to see the buildings up close. There wasn't much information given to us at Tulum.
So the last thing I want to discuss is my gay clubbing experience down there. On the last night there I went to the gay club called 'Karamba.' The cool part is that it was in the city center itself. As in it wasn't anywhere near any of the hotels. Another cool part was that it was their comedy night and so they had a drag queen telling jokes all night long. I understood none of it, but it was pretty cool to be able to watch the whole thing happening. The music was also amazing and the hospitality there was great. I went there on my own of course and within 30 minutes a group of locals invited me to join their group and we hang out the whole time. They spoke really good English so my horrible Spanish was not used very much. The music at the club was also really good. There were only 2 problems the whole night. 1) There wasn't too much dancing happening. Of course I ended up dancing, but that's just the type of guy I am. 2) One of my drinks got spiked. Now this was mainly my fault and luckily nothing happened, but it was still a little worrisome.
So that is my experience in Cancun. I really enjoyed every minute and hope that one day I am able to go back during their amazing spring break time. I can only imagine how crazy and full that whole place is when it is packed with college students. I also realized that I need to work on my Spanish a lot, but that my Spanish is decent enough to get me by. I was able to have a whole conversation with the taxi driver on the way to the club. That's got to amount to something right!
Ravishingly,
-Aram the Garmo
Monday, July 14, 2008
Cancun Part 1
Ok, so I don't have any of the pictures from Cancun, Mexico on my computer yet, but once I do I will upload a few of them up here so you can see the amazingness that is Cancun. Instead I will just talk about what I did in Cancun, and the random sites and such in the area.
Weather-wise Cancun took some getting used to. At first it was a little difficult to breathe due to the high humidity, but afterward you got used to it and it was normal. The heat was not unbearable like it is in Phoenix, and so it was nice to just walk around everywhere. We stayed at Moon Palace Resort right on the beach, but we never went into the beach. Since it was hurricane season, it was not safe enough for them to allow us to get into the ocean. That was for the better since I don't really like the ocean much anyways. So, instead, whenever we wanted to swim it was the swimming pools for us.
The first couple of days there we relaxed and learned the location. Within 2 hours I was already able to state which restaurants required formal clothes, which didn't, and the hours at which they were all open. All 17 of them. I was also able to name the time and location of a few of the resort sponsored activities that I was interested in participating in. We learned that everything on the resort was free (since we were at an all-inclusive resort). This meant that the restaurants were free, room service was free, the drinks were free, almost everything was free. This also meant you can eat whenever you want and however much you want. I automatically knew this was going to be a problem since I wasn't looking to gain weight on this trip so I would need to restrain myself from gorging.
The food at the place was actually quite good. Most of the time it was buffet style, but when it wasn't it felt like they were serving the buffet food to us anyway. In essence, even though there were 17 different restaurants, they all felt the same and seemed to have the same food. This was not very good, but at least it allowed for consistency. I personally liked my morning meal the best. It was a selection of 5 different fruits, a fruit smoothie, and a cup of tea. Also I'll occasionally have a slice of toast or eggs or something. Lunch and dinner was usually up for grabs, but I tried to keep it to one plate max and no desert. The sad part was that they had very limited salad options, and almost no vegetarian options. Very sad.
The activities were very exciting though. They had beach volleyball, salsa lessons, rumba lessons, jogging tours, guessing games, stretching, water aerobics, yoga, pilates, and other amazing things. I personally was the most interested in the yoga/pilates session early in the morning. So I got to drag my parents outside early morning to participate in yoga with me. It was so nice and refreshing. I really must say that I really like yoga. On the last day before leaving I participated in the stretching exercise also. I thought that was the most fun. I only found it on the last day and so I couldn't enjoy it on the other days, but the stretching was so much fun and worked on things I hadn't worked on in a while so it allowed me to enjoy my re-stretched body. It also was fun since the guy leading the stretching was a dancer and found out that I like to dance also and so he called me dancer the whole time. I actually felt pressured the whole time to be able to flex at least as far as he was the whole time (which I normally could), but when I couldn't he would goad me on and be like 'come on dancer.' That was funny. Oh, and random fact, he was 21. I feel like I've past my prime in dancing since I am so old, but I will still continue my passion. I feel young at heart.
I unfortunately must go now since I am busy getting my life ready for August. Come back tomorrow for the continuation of my Cancun trip. In it will be my talk about Mayan Ruins, and my gay clubbing experience!
Enthusiastically,
-Aram the Garmo
Weather-wise Cancun took some getting used to. At first it was a little difficult to breathe due to the high humidity, but afterward you got used to it and it was normal. The heat was not unbearable like it is in Phoenix, and so it was nice to just walk around everywhere. We stayed at Moon Palace Resort right on the beach, but we never went into the beach. Since it was hurricane season, it was not safe enough for them to allow us to get into the ocean. That was for the better since I don't really like the ocean much anyways. So, instead, whenever we wanted to swim it was the swimming pools for us.
The first couple of days there we relaxed and learned the location. Within 2 hours I was already able to state which restaurants required formal clothes, which didn't, and the hours at which they were all open. All 17 of them. I was also able to name the time and location of a few of the resort sponsored activities that I was interested in participating in. We learned that everything on the resort was free (since we were at an all-inclusive resort). This meant that the restaurants were free, room service was free, the drinks were free, almost everything was free. This also meant you can eat whenever you want and however much you want. I automatically knew this was going to be a problem since I wasn't looking to gain weight on this trip so I would need to restrain myself from gorging.
The food at the place was actually quite good. Most of the time it was buffet style, but when it wasn't it felt like they were serving the buffet food to us anyway. In essence, even though there were 17 different restaurants, they all felt the same and seemed to have the same food. This was not very good, but at least it allowed for consistency. I personally liked my morning meal the best. It was a selection of 5 different fruits, a fruit smoothie, and a cup of tea. Also I'll occasionally have a slice of toast or eggs or something. Lunch and dinner was usually up for grabs, but I tried to keep it to one plate max and no desert. The sad part was that they had very limited salad options, and almost no vegetarian options. Very sad.
The activities were very exciting though. They had beach volleyball, salsa lessons, rumba lessons, jogging tours, guessing games, stretching, water aerobics, yoga, pilates, and other amazing things. I personally was the most interested in the yoga/pilates session early in the morning. So I got to drag my parents outside early morning to participate in yoga with me. It was so nice and refreshing. I really must say that I really like yoga. On the last day before leaving I participated in the stretching exercise also. I thought that was the most fun. I only found it on the last day and so I couldn't enjoy it on the other days, but the stretching was so much fun and worked on things I hadn't worked on in a while so it allowed me to enjoy my re-stretched body. It also was fun since the guy leading the stretching was a dancer and found out that I like to dance also and so he called me dancer the whole time. I actually felt pressured the whole time to be able to flex at least as far as he was the whole time (which I normally could), but when I couldn't he would goad me on and be like 'come on dancer.' That was funny. Oh, and random fact, he was 21. I feel like I've past my prime in dancing since I am so old, but I will still continue my passion. I feel young at heart.
I unfortunately must go now since I am busy getting my life ready for August. Come back tomorrow for the continuation of my Cancun trip. In it will be my talk about Mayan Ruins, and my gay clubbing experience!
Enthusiastically,
-Aram the Garmo
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Another Change
So since I am back from my trip to Europe I will be changing my blog title to reflect my new status. Also, the poll is still in effect and will be closing in 28 days, so if you want to have your say as to what my blog will feature as its main component please vote soon.
In the next couple of days I will be finishing up my recollections and talks about my trip to England and also my trip to Cancun, Mexico. Hopefully they will add a few days to my blog, which (now with a little free time) hopefully will start having more posts.
In the next couple of days I will be finishing up my recollections and talks about my trip to England and also my trip to Cancun, Mexico. Hopefully they will add a few days to my blog, which (now with a little free time) hopefully will start having more posts.
Friday, July 11, 2008
Publicity?
So I was randomly scouring the internet and reading the random blogs I generally look at and I noticed something odd; for some reason another blog mentions mine! Now normally this occurs by one of my friends who is talking about me or something random, but the blog that mentions me is from someone I haven't even heard of! (Of course now I have and will be reading more of his material.) I've basically been mentioned in a blog post about Gay Armenians blogging which is sort of cool. I just didn't know that other people actually read my blog.
If you want to read the amazing post (done by: Onnik Krikorian) you can read it [here]. And to read more posts by Onnik Krikorian you can do so at his blog [here]. I'd also like to say thank you to Onnik for mentioning me in his post!
Happily,
-Aram the Garmo
If you want to read the amazing post (done by: Onnik Krikorian) you can read it [here]. And to read more posts by Onnik Krikorian you can do so at his blog [here]. I'd also like to say thank you to Onnik for mentioning me in his post!
Happily,
-Aram the Garmo
Monday, June 30, 2008
Random Talk
I just need to get my head cleared and so I am going to post some random thoughts on here. You can skip this post if you don't want to hear any of my stupid crazy thoughts.
So I was just watching the movie 'August Rush' and it made me bawl. I loved how the child didn't stop at anything to follow his music. He had no outside distractions to pull him away from the thing he loved and caused him extreme joy. And I am not talking about temporary moments of fleeting joy that is brought about by new and interesting things. I am talking about a passion so deep the thought of not being able to do it upsets you. You would rather die than not do it. You would choose it over food.
This concept was also shown to me in 'So you think you can dance' where a couple of girls lived their whole lives around dance. Everything they did would in some way help them in their pursuit for their passion.
And of course this helped me with my ideas on how I should pursue my life. I need to stop getting off track with my life. I need to decide which things in my life bring me absolute passion and follow them with all of my heart. I can no longer allow others to influence what I do. I can't let the latest trend stop me from doing the things I love.
The question then popped up, what is the passion that I should pursue. Time and time again the answer has been in front of my face, but I never noticed it. My absolute love in life is dance. I love to dance with all of my heart and body. Even to this day I don't know how I will survive a life in which I am not able to dance. I dread the day that I cannot dance anymore. Whenever I have visions of injury, I always wonder how I will continue to dance. So my first love is dance.
My second love is for maths. I will not stop my passion for maths in order to continue dance, and naturally I can do both at one time. It may hinder my life a little, but again I don't know what my life will be if I don't continue to learn about math and to help develop the subject further. And so I must continue to learn.
So with this new passion, I am unfortunately going to drift away from technology and the internet. I am moving away from web designing and logging every aspect of my life on the internet. I am going to stop worrying about continuing my education for teaching (even though I will continue school). I am going to stop everything and pursue the things that I love the most. And hopefully nothing will stop me.
With motivation,
Aram the Garmo
So I was just watching the movie 'August Rush' and it made me bawl. I loved how the child didn't stop at anything to follow his music. He had no outside distractions to pull him away from the thing he loved and caused him extreme joy. And I am not talking about temporary moments of fleeting joy that is brought about by new and interesting things. I am talking about a passion so deep the thought of not being able to do it upsets you. You would rather die than not do it. You would choose it over food.
This concept was also shown to me in 'So you think you can dance' where a couple of girls lived their whole lives around dance. Everything they did would in some way help them in their pursuit for their passion.
And of course this helped me with my ideas on how I should pursue my life. I need to stop getting off track with my life. I need to decide which things in my life bring me absolute passion and follow them with all of my heart. I can no longer allow others to influence what I do. I can't let the latest trend stop me from doing the things I love.
The question then popped up, what is the passion that I should pursue. Time and time again the answer has been in front of my face, but I never noticed it. My absolute love in life is dance. I love to dance with all of my heart and body. Even to this day I don't know how I will survive a life in which I am not able to dance. I dread the day that I cannot dance anymore. Whenever I have visions of injury, I always wonder how I will continue to dance. So my first love is dance.
My second love is for maths. I will not stop my passion for maths in order to continue dance, and naturally I can do both at one time. It may hinder my life a little, but again I don't know what my life will be if I don't continue to learn about math and to help develop the subject further. And so I must continue to learn.
So with this new passion, I am unfortunately going to drift away from technology and the internet. I am moving away from web designing and logging every aspect of my life on the internet. I am going to stop worrying about continuing my education for teaching (even though I will continue school). I am going to stop everything and pursue the things that I love the most. And hopefully nothing will stop me.
With motivation,
Aram the Garmo
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
New Look!
So I am in London right now and I won't be updating this almost at all. In fact the updates here will be at an all time low until around August time. Until then enjoy my brand new layout to my blog, and also take the time to vote on my poll on the right. Once I get back in track in August I will take your suggestions and begin to publish things as is wanted by my audience.
With much love,
-Aram the Garmo
With much love,
-Aram the Garmo
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Chinese Grocery Bags
I always hear around me that China is bad. It seems there is always someone saying something bad about the policies that China employs. People look at China and only look at the bad policies and don't look at China when it actually does something beneficial and better than most of the world. People see the way China handles child labour, they way they handle global economy, the way it handles security, and the internet, and all of that stuff, but people turn a blind eye to the good things China does.
This was prompted by an article I read a couple of days ago from Reuters about something that I feel China is doing good on. In essence, the article is saying that China is trying to stop the selling of plastic bags. The article can be found [here]. Apparently, in order to help protect the environment China is trying to stop people from buying plastic bags. They started a law that basically makes it illegal to produce thin plastic bags, which is what is most commonly used in China, and that if a store does use plastic bags they must charge for it. They are hoping this will cause people to start using reusable bags and to maybe switch to paper bags.
I find this amazing. This is one of the first countries that I have heard to do this at this scale. I have heard of hundreds of cities that employ this, but not a country. I think it's funny how America points their fingers at China and says that they won't decrease their Carbon Emissions until China does. America is basically saying they aren't going to be environmentally friendly until China does. Well guess what America, China has started. When is America going to follow suit and actually take global warming seriously and start to issue laws in order to help protect the environment? When is America going to realise that the future of the world is green and not massive oil consumption? When is America going to change? Hopefully, in 2009.
Hopefully,
-Aram the Garmo
This was prompted by an article I read a couple of days ago from Reuters about something that I feel China is doing good on. In essence, the article is saying that China is trying to stop the selling of plastic bags. The article can be found [here]. Apparently, in order to help protect the environment China is trying to stop people from buying plastic bags. They started a law that basically makes it illegal to produce thin plastic bags, which is what is most commonly used in China, and that if a store does use plastic bags they must charge for it. They are hoping this will cause people to start using reusable bags and to maybe switch to paper bags.
I find this amazing. This is one of the first countries that I have heard to do this at this scale. I have heard of hundreds of cities that employ this, but not a country. I think it's funny how America points their fingers at China and says that they won't decrease their Carbon Emissions until China does. America is basically saying they aren't going to be environmentally friendly until China does. Well guess what America, China has started. When is America going to follow suit and actually take global warming seriously and start to issue laws in order to help protect the environment? When is America going to realise that the future of the world is green and not massive oil consumption? When is America going to change? Hopefully, in 2009.
Hopefully,
-Aram the Garmo
Sunday, June 8, 2008
Farewell
The countdown has begun to my final farewell to England. In less than 9 days I will be flying out of Heathrow on my way back to the U.S. I am seriously going to miss everyone here. I have yet to pack my stuff and that will be done in the next two days. Today I will visit people, and I will be going to London on Wednesday, which is also the day my grades come out. *nervous*.
My arrival in California is going to be a little weird I expect. In order to understand, I must describe a whole story. So I am having my dad make the track jackets for my fraternity again. This is around the third time that I have asked him to do it, so I didn't think anything of it. My brother though overheard from somewhere that my dad actually looked up the details to my fraternity. Which means that he knows that I am in a gay fraternity. Of course my brother only overheard it, so I don't know what my father knows exactly, but he could easily find out that I am gay. This may turn into a very awkward trip to LA especially if he asks anything. I'm prepared for any questions, and I am not coming out of the closet to him yet. The reason is because he currently has all of my stuff, and I know he doesn't like homosexuality and so I don't want all of my stuff getting stuck at his place. So I will wait until all of my stuff are at mine and then tell him, or maybe just never tell him. He isn't very worth it anyway.
So that is what is waiting for me in LA and I hope it all goes good. I have backups just in case something happens, but still nervous.
That is all for today, I will update some tomorrow (hopefully).
Nervously,
-Aram the Garmo
My arrival in California is going to be a little weird I expect. In order to understand, I must describe a whole story. So I am having my dad make the track jackets for my fraternity again. This is around the third time that I have asked him to do it, so I didn't think anything of it. My brother though overheard from somewhere that my dad actually looked up the details to my fraternity. Which means that he knows that I am in a gay fraternity. Of course my brother only overheard it, so I don't know what my father knows exactly, but he could easily find out that I am gay. This may turn into a very awkward trip to LA especially if he asks anything. I'm prepared for any questions, and I am not coming out of the closet to him yet. The reason is because he currently has all of my stuff, and I know he doesn't like homosexuality and so I don't want all of my stuff getting stuck at his place. So I will wait until all of my stuff are at mine and then tell him, or maybe just never tell him. He isn't very worth it anyway.
So that is what is waiting for me in LA and I hope it all goes good. I have backups just in case something happens, but still nervous.
That is all for today, I will update some tomorrow (hopefully).
Nervously,
-Aram the Garmo
Saturday, June 7, 2008
Sorry
Sorry for not posting in FOREVER ... again! I was doing a lot of random stuff and visiting places such as Alton towers and Manchester. I will be putting up some posts in the coming days. I will hopefully have enough to cover my time while in London. If not then I may miss out on more posts. Sorry.
Sadly,
-Aram the Garmo
Sadly,
-Aram the Garmo
Monday, June 2, 2008
Dunkin Donuts vs. Terrorists?
So I was looking through Google reader and noticed this article which made me disappointed in Dunkin Donuts. I found this story [here] and was put on by CNN.
Story Summary:
So basically this whole thing starts off with Dunkin Donuts creating an advertising campaign in order to sell their new drink, an iced coffee. The online ad had Rachel Ray, from 30-minute meals on the food channel, posing with the iced coffee and a fringed black and white scarf. [The picture is provided on the left. I took it from CNN, which apparently copied it from AP. So please don't sue!] Apparently Conservative commentator Michelle Malkin took the scarf to represent a kaffiyeh which is more commonly worn by Arabs. In his syndicated column, Malkin wrote "The kaffiyeh, for the clueless, is the traditional scarf of Arab men that has come to symbolize murderous Palestinian jihad." At this point Dunkin Donuts decided to pull the advertising campaign because it did not want to look like it was supporting terrorism. Dunkin donuts even said that "absolutely no symbolism was intended." It had merely been a costuming choice.
This makes me not want to eat at Dunkin Donuts anymore even though it was one of my favorite doughnut shops. How can you pull an ad just because one person thinks that a scarf represents terrorism? Let us remember that symbols change and are also used by many people for different purposes. There are tons of people out there who wear this traditional headscarf and don't go around killing people. There are some who wear the headscarf and aren't terrorists. How can you combine a whole group of people and call them terrorists just because they wear a certain type of scarf? What ever happened to the lesson, "don't judge a book by its cover?" We can also see how symbols can have very different meanings. Looking at the swastika, it had been used for years as a symbol for peace, and didn't have such an anti-Semitic ideology behind it until the Nazis incorporated it into their flag. A symbol can have multiple meanings. This is why it pisses me off that Dunkin Donuts pulled the ad. There was nothing wrong with it, and in fact I thought the scarf looked good on Rachel Ray.
All opinions are welcome.
Ideologically yours,
-Aram the Garmo
Story Summary:
So basically this whole thing starts off with Dunkin Donuts creating an advertising campaign in order to sell their new drink, an iced coffee. The online ad had Rachel Ray, from 30-minute meals on the food channel, posing with the iced coffee and a fringed black and white scarf. [The picture is provided on the left. I took it from CNN, which apparently copied it from AP. So please don't sue!] Apparently Conservative commentator Michelle Malkin took the scarf to represent a kaffiyeh which is more commonly worn by Arabs. In his syndicated column, Malkin wrote "The kaffiyeh, for the clueless, is the traditional scarf of Arab men that has come to symbolize murderous Palestinian jihad." At this point Dunkin Donuts decided to pull the advertising campaign because it did not want to look like it was supporting terrorism. Dunkin donuts even said that "absolutely no symbolism was intended." It had merely been a costuming choice.
This makes me not want to eat at Dunkin Donuts anymore even though it was one of my favorite doughnut shops. How can you pull an ad just because one person thinks that a scarf represents terrorism? Let us remember that symbols change and are also used by many people for different purposes. There are tons of people out there who wear this traditional headscarf and don't go around killing people. There are some who wear the headscarf and aren't terrorists. How can you combine a whole group of people and call them terrorists just because they wear a certain type of scarf? What ever happened to the lesson, "don't judge a book by its cover?" We can also see how symbols can have very different meanings. Looking at the swastika, it had been used for years as a symbol for peace, and didn't have such an anti-Semitic ideology behind it until the Nazis incorporated it into their flag. A symbol can have multiple meanings. This is why it pisses me off that Dunkin Donuts pulled the ad. There was nothing wrong with it, and in fact I thought the scarf looked good on Rachel Ray.
All opinions are welcome.
Ideologically yours,
-Aram the Garmo
Sunday, June 1, 2008
Eurovision
So the Eurovision song contest happened a few days ago on 24 May. The entire show was fantastical and I think most of the countries did extremely well. A lot of people here in the UK believe that other countries mostly vote politically. But they use politically in the sense that the countries are neighbors to each other. Now I think this is partially true, but I don't think it has anything to do with politics. I think its because if you watch a performance and you see 2 really good performances and you have to choose which one you liked better, it is easier to choose the performance that comes from your neighbor or friend. And so I think it's mainly due to the fact that so many of the singers were amazing that it becomes really difficult to choose who you liked the best.
One sad thing that I noticed this year was the way in which Russia won. I do agree that Russia was really good, but I really think they won completely due to votingof neighbors rather than actual talent. The results ended up being:
Now I feel the actual order should have been:
Now why I think this is actually the fun part. I am basing this off of the semifinals which were designed to lower the number of people voting for their neighbors and so 'politics' would not play into it. I'll show some fun statistics from the top 4 countries in order to prove my point:
So as you can see, Russia got very unheavily biased during the finals. Also, Armenia lost many points due to the fact that many countries did not even vote for them. This is because Armenia is a small country that very many people have not heard of. I think this is what caused Armenia to lose in the end. They had the most number 1 votes in both the semi-final and in the final. They also were a very formidable opponent to everyone else even with getting at least 8 less votes than the rest of the top 4. (In comparison, Norway (who got 5th) had 7 more votes than Armenia!). So as you can see being a small country hurt Armenia greatly. Russia on the other hand, being a well-known superpower took that advantage and greatly boosted its chance of winning to the point of getting votes and also stealing almost all of Ukraine's number 1 votes and pushing Ukraine to second due to it. Greece got the most votes though and due to it did fairly well even if the Eastern bloc was against them.
In the end this shows that the eastern bloc is destined to win almost every Eurovision from here on out, but only the big countries that most people have heard of. Another key point is that non-eastern bloc countries will only get top 10 if they receive over 30 votes. So as it stands prediction of winners is very easy. My prediction for next year is that Ukraine wins. They are a well-known country with good singers, and also part of the Eastern Bloc.
Due to this weird system of voting, I have decided to not look at Eurovision as a song contest anymore. Instead I view it more as a concert of gay people. It a location where tons of gays hang out and watch as the campest singer from each country gets on stage and sings their heart out in as camp of a fashion as possible. So I personally can't wait for next year's Eurovision to see how camp it gets, and also to see the competition to Armenia. (I believe Armenia should have one this year but whatever :-p, that's just my Armenian bias).
So I will leave you with Armenia's performance at Eurovision.
Decidedly yours,
-Aram the Garmo
PS. I really wish I could have been one of those dancers! They are so dancing my style of dance, and I can do almost all of the moves except for 2 of them! I am so signing up to be a Eurovision dancer in a year or two!
One sad thing that I noticed this year was the way in which Russia won. I do agree that Russia was really good, but I really think they won completely due to votingof neighbors rather than actual talent. The results ended up being:
- Russia
- Ukraine
- Greece
- Armenia
- Norway
Now I feel the actual order should have been:
- Ukraine
- Armenia
- Greece
- Russia
- Portugal
Now why I think this is actually the fun part. I am basing this off of the semifinals which were designed to lower the number of people voting for their neighbors and so 'politics' would not play into it. I'll show some fun statistics from the top 4 countries in order to prove my point:
Russia:
| Ukraine:
| Greece:
| Armenia:
|
So as you can see, Russia got very unheavily biased during the finals. Also, Armenia lost many points due to the fact that many countries did not even vote for them. This is because Armenia is a small country that very many people have not heard of. I think this is what caused Armenia to lose in the end. They had the most number 1 votes in both the semi-final and in the final. They also were a very formidable opponent to everyone else even with getting at least 8 less votes than the rest of the top 4. (In comparison, Norway (who got 5th) had 7 more votes than Armenia!). So as you can see being a small country hurt Armenia greatly. Russia on the other hand, being a well-known superpower took that advantage and greatly boosted its chance of winning to the point of getting votes and also stealing almost all of Ukraine's number 1 votes and pushing Ukraine to second due to it. Greece got the most votes though and due to it did fairly well even if the Eastern bloc was against them.
In the end this shows that the eastern bloc is destined to win almost every Eurovision from here on out, but only the big countries that most people have heard of. Another key point is that non-eastern bloc countries will only get top 10 if they receive over 30 votes. So as it stands prediction of winners is very easy. My prediction for next year is that Ukraine wins. They are a well-known country with good singers, and also part of the Eastern Bloc.
Due to this weird system of voting, I have decided to not look at Eurovision as a song contest anymore. Instead I view it more as a concert of gay people. It a location where tons of gays hang out and watch as the campest singer from each country gets on stage and sings their heart out in as camp of a fashion as possible. So I personally can't wait for next year's Eurovision to see how camp it gets, and also to see the competition to Armenia. (I believe Armenia should have one this year but whatever :-p, that's just my Armenian bias).
So I will leave you with Armenia's performance at Eurovision.
Decidedly yours,
-Aram the Garmo
PS. I really wish I could have been one of those dancers! They are so dancing my style of dance, and I can do almost all of the moves except for 2 of them! I am so signing up to be a Eurovision dancer in a year or two!
Saturday, May 31, 2008
Christmas Cards
So every single year my mom begs us to make Christmas cards with a picture of the family on it. You know the ones where everyone poses in front of a Christmas tree and then the picture is sent out as the actual card rather than buying a card from the store. So while I was studying for exams I had this immense urge to create a Christmas card for the parents for this year. I used photoshop for the first time to make the card, and I think it looks really good. It is not amazing or anything, but it looks really good. It is still not completely done and it may also be altered in order to have the picture of the family be different or even have a different message, and basically just logistical issues, but other than that it is pretty much complete. Here are the images of the Christmas card that I made:
The project took me a little over 4 hours all together and I think it ended up looking really nice. I am extremely proud of myself and I can't wait to design more interesting creations using photoshop. It's really fun when you learn how to use it properly, and actually is not that complicated. It just has a unique way of doing things.
Make sure to comment on the pictures and tell me how you like them and if there is anything that I need to change in order to make them look better. If I change anything major I'll create a new post with the updated pictures.
In a holiday mood,
-Aram the Garmo
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The project took me a little over 4 hours all together and I think it ended up looking really nice. I am extremely proud of myself and I can't wait to design more interesting creations using photoshop. It's really fun when you learn how to use it properly, and actually is not that complicated. It just has a unique way of doing things.
Make sure to comment on the pictures and tell me how you like them and if there is anything that I need to change in order to make them look better. If I change anything major I'll create a new post with the updated pictures.
In a holiday mood,
-Aram the Garmo
Friday, May 30, 2008
Graduation
So the past couple of weeks have been filled with intensive studying sessions and also examinations in order to finish my final year as an undergraduate. When I get back to California I will have been graduated and will have my Bachelor of Science in Mathematics. I feel all smart.
As my exam results come out on 11 June, I figure I am going to try and make predictions as to what my grades will be for all of my classes depending on the amount of work I did and how well I did on the exam.
EDUC1002(Contexts for Learning): 50%
MATH3152(Coding Theory):65%
MATH2015(Analysis 2):55%
MATH2032(Rings, Polynomials, & Fields):80%
MATH3024(Homotopy and Surfaces):90%
I hope these are my final grades, because I need to pass all of my classes and average a 65% in order to fully qualify into UC Davis' Masters program. As of right now I have been conditionally excepted into UC Davis' teaching credential/masters program. I have already set up my living for next year, and can't wait to be back in Davis.
As I have more free time I will be discussing some topics from the past that I wanted to blog about, but never had time, and I will do this in the coming days. I will also hopefully get back into writing in this blog.
Enthusiastically,
-Aram the Garmo
As my exam results come out on 11 June, I figure I am going to try and make predictions as to what my grades will be for all of my classes depending on the amount of work I did and how well I did on the exam.
EDUC1002(Contexts for Learning): 50%
MATH3152(Coding Theory):65%
MATH2015(Analysis 2):55%
MATH2032(Rings, Polynomials, & Fields):80%
MATH3024(Homotopy and Surfaces):90%
I hope these are my final grades, because I need to pass all of my classes and average a 65% in order to fully qualify into UC Davis' Masters program. As of right now I have been conditionally excepted into UC Davis' teaching credential/masters program. I have already set up my living for next year, and can't wait to be back in Davis.
As I have more free time I will be discussing some topics from the past that I wanted to blog about, but never had time, and I will do this in the coming days. I will also hopefully get back into writing in this blog.
Enthusiastically,
-Aram the Garmo
Saturday, May 17, 2008
Impossible Dreams
It's sort of funny how people tend to have impossible dreams. It helps them move forward and be able to accomplish more than they ever would have been able to otherwise. But sometimes it can turn a person lethargic due to the fact they don't know how to accomplish their dream, or they have so many dreams they don't know which to pursue. I seem to fall under the latter category.
I feel like there are so many different things I want to accomplish in life there has got to be absolutely no time to ever actually do everything I want. I think not even 100 years is going to be enough to be able to do all I want, which is a sad yet realistic ideal. I blame most of it on my inability to sleep less than 9 hours a night. This takes a large chunk out of my day. I wish I was like normal humans who only needed around 7 hours of sleep, and like most teenagers who can survive on 2. But unfortuantely I am not and so I have less time to accomplish the impossible.
Now if you are like my dad, you will probably think that nothing is impossible. If you set your mind to it you can accomplish any goal you ever wanted. Now although I believe that for most things, I feel that there are limitations. An example, it is currently impossible to stand in the center of the Earth. That would be one dream that would literally be impossible. You would be dead by the time you got there. But my impossibility relies more on the fact that I have so many goals in life that I will never be able to accomplish all of them. To understand I will list most of my goals in life:
So as you can see my list is fairly long and will not ever be accomplished. I don't even know where to really begin. I feel like my life takes turns. One second my entire dream is to be a professional dancer, and then the next I'm back to being a computer geek, and then the next I'm on a teaching frenzy. It's like I jump from topic to topic never being able to accomplish anything in any one topic because of it. I don't know where to begin and so I don't know where to end. I also feel being social with friends hinders my goals. The only reason I feel they hinder me is when they want to go out clubbing. Now don't get me wrong, I love going clubbing, but it ends up wasting so much time. That is at least 5 hours of your life that you are ruining because you are going out. It helps that I prefer not to get drunk so that the next day I feel more refreshed, but clubbing takes a lot out of you. I wish sometimes it was easy to live without friends.
Well, those are my impossible dreams. My true goal in life is to accomplish just one of those. Which one, I have no idea, but I hope one day it will come to me.
Unpredictably yours,
-Aram the Garmo
I feel like there are so many different things I want to accomplish in life there has got to be absolutely no time to ever actually do everything I want. I think not even 100 years is going to be enough to be able to do all I want, which is a sad yet realistic ideal. I blame most of it on my inability to sleep less than 9 hours a night. This takes a large chunk out of my day. I wish I was like normal humans who only needed around 7 hours of sleep, and like most teenagers who can survive on 2. But unfortuantely I am not and so I have less time to accomplish the impossible.
Now if you are like my dad, you will probably think that nothing is impossible. If you set your mind to it you can accomplish any goal you ever wanted. Now although I believe that for most things, I feel that there are limitations. An example, it is currently impossible to stand in the center of the Earth. That would be one dream that would literally be impossible. You would be dead by the time you got there. But my impossibility relies more on the fact that I have so many goals in life that I will never be able to accomplish all of them. To understand I will list most of my goals in life:
- Teach a child math well enough for them to be the next 'genius' in mathematics.
- Solve Fermat's last theorem using only theorems available to him.
- Prove that there are infintely many twin primes.
- Understand all topics of mathematics.
- Understand all topics of Chemsitry.
- Understand all topics of Physics.
- Contribute something to the field of Physics.
- Understand the ideas of most (famous) philosophers.
- Perform in an actual dance company.
- Write a science fiction book.
- Create a website (that people actually visit).
- Be listened to.
- Get married.
- Learn the following languages:
- Italian
- French
- German
- Swedish
- Arabic
- Chinese (Mandarin)
- Japanese
- Latin
- Greek
- Russian
- Stay on top of video games.
- Read over 100 books
- And probably other things I can't remember right now
So as you can see my list is fairly long and will not ever be accomplished. I don't even know where to really begin. I feel like my life takes turns. One second my entire dream is to be a professional dancer, and then the next I'm back to being a computer geek, and then the next I'm on a teaching frenzy. It's like I jump from topic to topic never being able to accomplish anything in any one topic because of it. I don't know where to begin and so I don't know where to end. I also feel being social with friends hinders my goals. The only reason I feel they hinder me is when they want to go out clubbing. Now don't get me wrong, I love going clubbing, but it ends up wasting so much time. That is at least 5 hours of your life that you are ruining because you are going out. It helps that I prefer not to get drunk so that the next day I feel more refreshed, but clubbing takes a lot out of you. I wish sometimes it was easy to live without friends.
Well, those are my impossible dreams. My true goal in life is to accomplish just one of those. Which one, I have no idea, but I hope one day it will come to me.
Unpredictably yours,
-Aram the Garmo
Friday, May 16, 2008
CA Same-Sex Marriage ruling
So this is just a quick note because I feel everyone should know this news. The Supreme Court of California ruled yesterday that banning homosexuals from marriage is discriminatory and therefore is unconstitutional. In essence, gays now have the right to marry. If you would like to hear about the report from an actual news agency [Reuters]. That is all I basically wanted to state for today. Have a good night!
Gayly,
-Aram the Garmo
Gayly,
-Aram the Garmo
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Busy Life
So I was talking to my friend Alberto the other day and I realised why I'm going crazy. The main reason is because I am absolutely not busy enough. I am going to compare what I do now on a daily basis as compared to what I used to do last year in order to show the difference in activity level.
This year:
And that is pretty much all. Now compare it to just last year.
Last Year:
Now of course it isn't that huge of a difference, but it's enough to make me outrageously bored now, and with nothing to do. It has caused me to think a lot and also streamline my life even more, which also gives me more free time unfortunately.
I think this may be one of the reasons I can't wait to go back to California since life there is much more welcoming to being busy. I can easily get a job, and can easily make myself super busy super quickly. And with my new computer next year, I can easily restart playing video games once I do get more time.
So as for now, I try to make due with the time I have, but boredom causes me to not work which then causes me to get behind everything. I need more work stress in my life.
In complete boredom,
-Aram the Garmo
This year:
- Dance Expose
- 5 classes (semester system)
- LGBT Society
- Hanging out with friends
- Applying for Masters Program
- Finding somewhere to live next year
And that is pretty much all. Now compare it to just last year.
Last Year:
- Telemark Dance Troupe
- 6 classes (quarter system)
- LGBT Centre
- President of a fraternity
- Hanging out with friends
- Finding out requisies for Teaching Credentials
- Applying for Study Abroad in UK
- Working around 15-20 hours per week
- Participating in the Student Board of Directors for Sodexho
- Working with a trade union to help them unionise
- Going to Theatre performances for Dance Major
Now of course it isn't that huge of a difference, but it's enough to make me outrageously bored now, and with nothing to do. It has caused me to think a lot and also streamline my life even more, which also gives me more free time unfortunately.
I think this may be one of the reasons I can't wait to go back to California since life there is much more welcoming to being busy. I can easily get a job, and can easily make myself super busy super quickly. And with my new computer next year, I can easily restart playing video games once I do get more time.
So as for now, I try to make due with the time I have, but boredom causes me to not work which then causes me to get behind everything. I need more work stress in my life.
In complete boredom,
-Aram the Garmo
Monday, May 12, 2008
Shopping Spree
So I was feeling down the other day due to some issues in my life, and I decided that it was time to do something about it. I had saved up £250 on the side for a rainy day, and so I decided that since I was in the middle of a downpour that I should look into using it. So I decided to take the money and participate in some retail therapy. For those who don't know, retail therapy is when you go out to a mall, or shopping district, and buy massive amounts of items, spending more money than you have, in order to feel better. The main way that retail therapy works is that you go out and you buy brand new clothes which make you look good. Since then you look good on the outside, you feel that you can newly conquer the world and get whatever you want due to your new amazing looks. This then creates a heightened experience of euphoria in which you feel good about yourself and whatever issues you were going through seem insignificant. Retail therapy usually works best after a break-up in order to make yourself know that it wasn't because of you bad looks that you broke-up.
So I decided retail therapy was in order in order to make myself feel better. I ended up buying some really good stuff, and almost wish I had more money and time in order to be able to buy even more stuff. But I am going to show all the things I bought cause they are pretty cool!
So I hope you liked all of them. I didn't include any links to the websites because all the websites are flash based so I can't even directly link to any of them, but all of the images above are copyrighted by the respective companies they came from, just to let you all know :-p. I also bought stuff from H&M, but they don't put their clothing online for some stupid reason, so I couldn't get images of them, but I bought 2 shorts from them which was cool. I also ended up getting a haircut which was pretty cool.
So after spending around £200 I am feeling much better and feel very sexy. That is pretty much all for today. I'll chat laters!
Feeling Sexy,
-Aram the Garmo
So I decided retail therapy was in order in order to make myself feel better. I ended up buying some really good stuff, and almost wish I had more money and time in order to be able to buy even more stuff. But I am going to show all the things I bought cause they are pretty cool!
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A shirt from River Island - £10 | A shirt from Top Man - $14 |
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Leather Dunlop bag from River Island - £20 | Blue Dunlop bag from Top Man - £20 |
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Converse Shoe from Office - £35 | |
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Dish Scrubber from Octopus for the Parents - £12 | Penguin Flask from Octupus for the Parents - £18 |
So I hope you liked all of them. I didn't include any links to the websites because all the websites are flash based so I can't even directly link to any of them, but all of the images above are copyrighted by the respective companies they came from, just to let you all know :-p. I also bought stuff from H&M, but they don't put their clothing online for some stupid reason, so I couldn't get images of them, but I bought 2 shorts from them which was cool. I also ended up getting a haircut which was pretty cool.
So after spending around £200 I am feeling much better and feel very sexy. That is pretty much all for today. I'll chat laters!
Feeling Sexy,
-Aram the Garmo
Friday, May 9, 2008
Monday, April 28, 2008
Patience
We always here people saying that patience is a virtue, and that everyone needs more patience. Patience is a very funny thing. It is one of those things you need, but how much of it? There is a such thing as too much patience, and when mixed with optimism it causes conflict.
Patience is generally a good thing. It allows us to not complain when we don't get our food right on time, or when we are stuck in traffic. Patience is also a key component in teaching as the teacher must wait for the student to reach their level of knowledge. Patience would allow the teacher to take the time to be able to teach the student at the pace that the student requires. An impatient teacher would not be beneficial to the student as then the teacher will teach things the student is not ready for, causing the student to no longer pay attention, which in the end creates apathy and hatred for the subject.
As I said earlier though, patience can sometimes tun into a bad thing. An example of this can be seen in some relationships. Say there is a guy and a girl and the two like each other. The guy is otherwise preoccupied such as a guy normally is. The guy also has family issues in which the girl helps him out and supports him the whole time. The closeness brings them together and they start seeing each other. But by choosing this guy the girl has caused anger to some of her friends and the guy is also too distracted with family issues. This is where the problem arises of what the girl should do. Being optimistic and patient may in the end hurt the girl more than she realises. She can sit there and wait forever for the guy to turn around and stop having family issues, or for her friends to realise that she is seriously not doing anything wrong. This patience though can sometimes hurt the girl so much that it will overburden them. This is why sometimes patience is not a necessarily good thing. It causes you to put yourself through torchure in the hopes that one day it will get better in the situation you are in, even though you can always just change the situation and reap benefits almost immediately.
So in the end I recommend that people stay being patient, but to not force themselves to be patient if by doing so causes them to harm themselves mentally, physically, emotionally or otherwise.
Impatiently,
-Aram the Garmo
Sunday, April 27, 2008
The Bigger Picture
It's sort of funny how sometimes we look at something and automatically assume we know everything about it. As an example take the very simple equation of 2+2. Now if I were to ask you what 2+2 is equal to, I am going to assume that more than 80% of the world would turn to me and say 4. My example is coming from a quote, that I am stealing from the BBC Website [found here], by John Hurt in which he said "There's no way of disproving that two plus two equals four, and therefore, take that to the ultimate, much more complicated areas, and you're dealing with something which is truthful."
Now wait one second John, we have a problem here. Again there are quite a few assumptions being made here. The first assumption is that we are even talking about maths. If I were to say tu and tu make a tutu so that it can be worn, now wouldn't that also partially logically make sense? And if you say it outloud it makes more sense. In this case it doesn't equal four, but instead an article of clothing. Just for arguments sake we will assume he was in fact talking about maths and that all those in the conversation knew that. Then I quickly notice another major assumption he is making, that we are talking base 10. If we are talking base 2, such as would be used in computer science, then two plus two is equal to 100. (Or in written out form: 10 + 10 = 100). So again I am playing around with the usage of the words.
Now let us assume instead of saying the words, he actually wrote out that 2+2=4. In this case I can no longer use the previous two arguments, but I can STILL find that he is assuming even more things. He is assuming that we are still talking in base 10! Just for kicks pretend we are in base 3. Again I can write out quickly that 2+2=11, not 4. And if we take away the whole concept of bases, then I can still show another assumption! Assume you are in the field of integers modulo 4. Then we get the equation that 2+2=0.
It is not John's fault that he assumed all of this because we all make assumptions every single day of our lives. Assumptions are what help us get through the day without having to explain every single tiny aspect of our lives. But sometimes assumptions can be very bad. An assumption turns bad when you are arguing with someone and to you it seems like they understand you but are refusing to listen. I have seen this so many times it pains me. I think as humans when we start to argue we need to take a step back from the situation and be able to look at the argument from the other person's perspective. Would we be doing the same thing? Why are we even arguing over this topic? I think you will find that if you try and think about what the other person is thinking, you will find out that you were making a lot of assumptions about them understanding what you are trying to say.
Realise that everyone thinks differently and that we will never be able to understand the way another person thinks. We must try and understand in order to communicate better. I took a clip off of youtube.com that I personally liked that shows another example of this in the sense of a small young boy. Notice how his life was 'ruined' just because he thought in a different way and no one around him took the time to ask, 'how is he thinking?'
Now wait one second John, we have a problem here. Again there are quite a few assumptions being made here. The first assumption is that we are even talking about maths. If I were to say tu and tu make a tutu so that it can be worn, now wouldn't that also partially logically make sense? And if you say it outloud it makes more sense. In this case it doesn't equal four, but instead an article of clothing. Just for arguments sake we will assume he was in fact talking about maths and that all those in the conversation knew that. Then I quickly notice another major assumption he is making, that we are talking base 10. If we are talking base 2, such as would be used in computer science, then two plus two is equal to 100. (Or in written out form: 10 + 10 = 100). So again I am playing around with the usage of the words.
Now let us assume instead of saying the words, he actually wrote out that 2+2=4. In this case I can no longer use the previous two arguments, but I can STILL find that he is assuming even more things. He is assuming that we are still talking in base 10! Just for kicks pretend we are in base 3. Again I can write out quickly that 2+2=11, not 4. And if we take away the whole concept of bases, then I can still show another assumption! Assume you are in the field of integers modulo 4. Then we get the equation that 2+2=0.
It is not John's fault that he assumed all of this because we all make assumptions every single day of our lives. Assumptions are what help us get through the day without having to explain every single tiny aspect of our lives. But sometimes assumptions can be very bad. An assumption turns bad when you are arguing with someone and to you it seems like they understand you but are refusing to listen. I have seen this so many times it pains me. I think as humans when we start to argue we need to take a step back from the situation and be able to look at the argument from the other person's perspective. Would we be doing the same thing? Why are we even arguing over this topic? I think you will find that if you try and think about what the other person is thinking, you will find out that you were making a lot of assumptions about them understanding what you are trying to say.
Realise that everyone thinks differently and that we will never be able to understand the way another person thinks. We must try and understand in order to communicate better. I took a clip off of youtube.com that I personally liked that shows another example of this in the sense of a small young boy. Notice how his life was 'ruined' just because he thought in a different way and no one around him took the time to ask, 'how is he thinking?'
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Conflicting Values
So I will try and update a few times a week from now on. And it will always be updating at 22:00. This one is a tad bit late, but my dinner took longer to make than I expected.
Today, my blog is not going to be about words. It's a picture that I drew. It is basically me currently. It is not an amazing drawing or picture, but I feel it is good enough to upload. Hope you enjoy it. (click on it to enlarge it)
Artistically,
-Aram the Garmo
Today, my blog is not going to be about words. It's a picture that I drew. It is basically me currently. It is not an amazing drawing or picture, but I feel it is good enough to upload. Hope you enjoy it. (click on it to enlarge it)
Artistically,
-Aram the Garmo
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Suicidal Tendencies
I was having an atypically bad day today and of course it caused me to start thinking about suicide which is weird considering I haven't thought about that in ages. I don't even know what in particular brought on this onset of crazy emotions, but I know how to deal with it and I am just waiting for the next day to hit so that I don't do anything stupid. But today I thought that since I am feeling in this mood, why not discuss suicidal tendencies?
So there are a lot of people worldwide who think about suicide as a valid option for escape from their deteriorating lives. They think that having no life must be better than living in this hell hole. I can occasionally understand their point of view considering that I was suicidal for a good portion of my life, and so I speak with utmost respect for them, but what I don't like is when other people go on about talking about suicide as the worst thing a person can do to themselves. I do not agree with that. I think there is absolutely nothing wrong with suicide. In the end it is the person who is taking their own life, and since it is their body, their mind, their life that they are destroying, I think it should be their decision if they kill themselves. I think it can also be pretty cool to know exactly when and how you are going to die because then at least you can prepare for it. You can fix all the broken ties and leave on a happy note rather than on a tragic unexpected note that generally occurs with most deaths.
Others will try and say that suicide is actually a horrible thing to go through. It is selfish to think that it is only affecting yourself and that you will be hurting all of those people in your life that truly love you and depend on you to get through their own day. I think this is the only valid point against suicide, but at the same time, it is a weird concept. By telling someone that everyone else would be sad if they kill themselves it is almost like peer pressuring them into not offing themselves. I think it's weird that this form of peer pressure is thought of as good, but when peer pressure is used to get someone to start smoking it suddenly negative. I thought the point was to be your own individual and not let others peer pressure you to do anything you don't want to, such as live. So that is why I think it is sort of weird considering this option even though it is the only valid one.
I think the worst thing though is that in the states it is actually illegal to try and kill yourself. This makes complete and logical sense. Someone thinks they have a shit life, so instead of trying to make their lives better we are going to ruin it by giving them a fine/throwing them in jail (don't know the actualy sentence, but know it's illegal). Now where does that make sense? Make a suicidal person's life more miserable. Yes, I believe everyone should do that! Does the U.S. government really think that some random law is going to stop people from killing themselves? When you are dead, laws no longer apply! I mean if the U.S. wants to send dead people to prison then they can, but I feel our prisons already have too many people in them.
Now there are of course also success stories in which someone attempts to kill themselves, fails, and then leads a life and they suddenly are happy they never killed themselves. Now these stories don't occur very often, and are very one sided. You hear tons of these stories, but you never hear of the stories of the people who try and kill themselves, fail, and then wish for the rest of their lives that they actually went through with it. That may be because they are too afraid to come out in the open. Suicide is so badly looked upon that people are afraid to talk about it openly. Just like death, which is what I think the biggest factor in all of this is.
I don't personally understand why so many people are afraid of death. Everyone will encounter death in their lifetimes and so it is ridiculous to be afraid of it and to want it to never happen. If you stop someone from killing themselves now, they will eventually die anyway! You can't keep someone alive forever, and I don't see why you would want to. Yes, I understand that people fear death because it is unknown. YOu may have your faith telling you what is going to happen after you die, but you don't truly know. There is no scientific way (currently) of finding out what is going to happen to yourself after you die. And so because of this we are afraid of it. In fact we are deathly afraid of it (pun intended). But I don't like that fear, instead I like to consider it a celebration. Instead of being sad that someone died, why not celebrate the life they had? Everyone has some bit of their life that must have been extraordinary to someone. Even serial killers must have some good portion of their lives that is interesting to someone else. So why not celebrate that they were here, had fun some of the time, effected people positively, and moved on into the next phase of existance called death. I think being sad at someone's death is actually very selfish. The only reason you are sad is because you are no longer going to have the opportunity to say that one thing that you wanted, or to hug them one last time, or to have their presence. Basically, you are sad because YOU wanted them to still be alive. That is a pretty selfish thing to want I must say. But I guess it is in the nature of people to be selfish, which again loops back around to people killing themselves, selfish.
So I may be sad that people die, or kill themselves, but I am not going to let that sadness grow. Death is the end of your life which is fun, but I don't want death to be a sad thing. Instead I feel it should be celebrated. And I feel if someone does kill themselves, it shouldn't be considered sinful, or 'bad', instead it should be considered honorary that the person had enough guts that they were able to actually kill themselves. It should be honoured like in the olden days when suicide was sometimes considered very honourable.
So I will let you all think about that one as I get myself prepared for a long night of massive depression and not wanting to talk to anyone and just wanting the day to be over, because my selfish needs of self-fulfillment are not done yet.
Suicidely yours,
-Aram the Garmo
So there are a lot of people worldwide who think about suicide as a valid option for escape from their deteriorating lives. They think that having no life must be better than living in this hell hole. I can occasionally understand their point of view considering that I was suicidal for a good portion of my life, and so I speak with utmost respect for them, but what I don't like is when other people go on about talking about suicide as the worst thing a person can do to themselves. I do not agree with that. I think there is absolutely nothing wrong with suicide. In the end it is the person who is taking their own life, and since it is their body, their mind, their life that they are destroying, I think it should be their decision if they kill themselves. I think it can also be pretty cool to know exactly when and how you are going to die because then at least you can prepare for it. You can fix all the broken ties and leave on a happy note rather than on a tragic unexpected note that generally occurs with most deaths.
Others will try and say that suicide is actually a horrible thing to go through. It is selfish to think that it is only affecting yourself and that you will be hurting all of those people in your life that truly love you and depend on you to get through their own day. I think this is the only valid point against suicide, but at the same time, it is a weird concept. By telling someone that everyone else would be sad if they kill themselves it is almost like peer pressuring them into not offing themselves. I think it's weird that this form of peer pressure is thought of as good, but when peer pressure is used to get someone to start smoking it suddenly negative. I thought the point was to be your own individual and not let others peer pressure you to do anything you don't want to, such as live. So that is why I think it is sort of weird considering this option even though it is the only valid one.
I think the worst thing though is that in the states it is actually illegal to try and kill yourself. This makes complete and logical sense. Someone thinks they have a shit life, so instead of trying to make their lives better we are going to ruin it by giving them a fine/throwing them in jail (don't know the actualy sentence, but know it's illegal). Now where does that make sense? Make a suicidal person's life more miserable. Yes, I believe everyone should do that! Does the U.S. government really think that some random law is going to stop people from killing themselves? When you are dead, laws no longer apply! I mean if the U.S. wants to send dead people to prison then they can, but I feel our prisons already have too many people in them.
Now there are of course also success stories in which someone attempts to kill themselves, fails, and then leads a life and they suddenly are happy they never killed themselves. Now these stories don't occur very often, and are very one sided. You hear tons of these stories, but you never hear of the stories of the people who try and kill themselves, fail, and then wish for the rest of their lives that they actually went through with it. That may be because they are too afraid to come out in the open. Suicide is so badly looked upon that people are afraid to talk about it openly. Just like death, which is what I think the biggest factor in all of this is.
I don't personally understand why so many people are afraid of death. Everyone will encounter death in their lifetimes and so it is ridiculous to be afraid of it and to want it to never happen. If you stop someone from killing themselves now, they will eventually die anyway! You can't keep someone alive forever, and I don't see why you would want to. Yes, I understand that people fear death because it is unknown. YOu may have your faith telling you what is going to happen after you die, but you don't truly know. There is no scientific way (currently) of finding out what is going to happen to yourself after you die. And so because of this we are afraid of it. In fact we are deathly afraid of it (pun intended). But I don't like that fear, instead I like to consider it a celebration. Instead of being sad that someone died, why not celebrate the life they had? Everyone has some bit of their life that must have been extraordinary to someone. Even serial killers must have some good portion of their lives that is interesting to someone else. So why not celebrate that they were here, had fun some of the time, effected people positively, and moved on into the next phase of existance called death. I think being sad at someone's death is actually very selfish. The only reason you are sad is because you are no longer going to have the opportunity to say that one thing that you wanted, or to hug them one last time, or to have their presence. Basically, you are sad because YOU wanted them to still be alive. That is a pretty selfish thing to want I must say. But I guess it is in the nature of people to be selfish, which again loops back around to people killing themselves, selfish.
So I may be sad that people die, or kill themselves, but I am not going to let that sadness grow. Death is the end of your life which is fun, but I don't want death to be a sad thing. Instead I feel it should be celebrated. And I feel if someone does kill themselves, it shouldn't be considered sinful, or 'bad', instead it should be considered honorary that the person had enough guts that they were able to actually kill themselves. It should be honoured like in the olden days when suicide was sometimes considered very honourable.
So I will let you all think about that one as I get myself prepared for a long night of massive depression and not wanting to talk to anyone and just wanting the day to be over, because my selfish needs of self-fulfillment are not done yet.
Suicidely yours,
-Aram the Garmo
Monday, April 21, 2008
Jealousy
It seems that there are a lot of things to be jealous about in the world around us. We can be jealous of the super rich people out there who are able to buy anything they want without worrying how they'll be able to afford their next meal. We can be jealous of the super smart people who seem to have their brains prewired to be able to understand every single thing you tell them. We tend to be jealous of people who have something, especially when that something is what we want.
Is jealousy a good thing though? I personally can't see any form of jealousy that can be taken into a good form. If you are jealous of the rich, most people will just try and degrade the rich in order to 'bring them down to your level.' This can be done by causing a scandal, revealing secrets, or being extremely happy when something goes bad with the rich. You can also be jealous because no matter how you attempt to get that crazy amount of money, it always seems out of your grasp. But do you have the right to be jealous? Are you not happy that the other person was able to become rich? Are you not excited that they do not have to worry about feeding their family anymore? You may turn around and say that you really don't care because you don't know the person, but how about if you did?! If your best friend suddenly won the lotto, would you be jealous of them, and is that jealousy rightly placed? I feel instead of being jealous, you should be proud that your friend no longer needs to worry about their life. That, as long as the money was used properly, your friend will be able to support their family and actually pursue the things they desire. Isn't that something that we all dream of?
How about jealousy of the really smart? This is probably where I fit in, because I tend to be jealous of the really smart. But do we have the right to be jealous of the knowledgable? Isn't the point of discovering new things in order to understand the universe a little better? Should it really matter who discovers the next smallest particle, or the newest theory in math? It may be hard to see those around you succeeding in academics, but is that a valid enough reason to be jealous of them? We are all put on the planet, and we all hope to learn. I feel we should be happy of the people who end up learning more than we do because then they may be able to further our understanding of the universe. That one day may turn into us becoming a much more sophisticated species and be able to do things we had never imagined before. The main reason, I feel, that we become jealous is that because we would like our names to be written down in history books instead of others' name.
So in essence my question is, is there a reason to ever be jealous and to actually act on it? I am not denying that people get jealous, but I am wondering if there is ever a valid reason to be jealous and then actually take that jealousy to an extreme (such as stealing from the rich, and keeping it from yourself; taking ideas from the smart, and publishing it as your own; etc.). Is that ever permissable?
Inquisitively,
-Aram the Garmo
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Aloneness
[Note: I didn't know if I wanted this in my blog, but decided why not just throw it in, so it is backdated to the day I wrote it, and has not been edited, and obviously was never finished.]
I think life can sometimes be a funny thing. We begin our lives attached to one person, literally. We eat, breathe, drink, think, and do everything this other person does. We don't even know it until a few years later, but this person is our mother. From here we are attached to a unit called a family. This unit in most cases consists of a mother, a father, and occasionally siblings or grandparents. From here on you are considered part of a family and your every move is noticed. Every sound you make is heard, every step you take is stared at, every time you touched something you were glared at; everything was noticed. You had a whole family with you; you were not alone.
You slowly grow older and you become aware of everything you are doing. You go into a form of the real world called school. In school you realise there are other people in your age group! For some reason or another you choose others like you that have similar tastes. You call them your friends and you start to do everything together. Whenever your family wasn't there, your friends were, and vice versa. You always had somewhere to be with you; you were not alone.
Eventually you start growing hairs in unexpected places. The grownups call it puberty, but you call it awkwardness. Some get acne, and some get breasts. It is an awkward time, and so you begin to withdraw. At the same time you also begin to realise that you are your own human being and start to become unique. Usually you would rebel against your parents, and have friends doing it too. You start doing everything with your friends, and when you are home, you are secretly wishing you are back with your friends. Your family keeps wanting to stay in your life, but you push them away and keep only your friends, but as long as you have your friends, you are not alone.
From then on, you keep your friends for a while. Sometimes you may lose them all and go back to your family for support. Your family will take you with open arms. Sometimes your family rejects you and so you stick with your friends, who take you with open arms. In either case there is a form of humans that stick by you. They are the people you turn to in case of problems, questions, and other such things that may arise; you are not alone.
The question becomes, what happens if somewhere along the line this system fucks up? What happens if you are desperatly, and utterly alone, sometimes literally. When alone, the world sucks. It doesn't matter what the world throws at you, there is only you behind the bat. If it's something simple then you are easily able to get back on track and keep going. On the other hand if it is something large and unavoidable, then you have problems. Being alone there is no where you can turn for support, there is no helping hand for guidance, there is no one standing behind you helping with the bat. And due to this you may not be able to swing hard enough to hit the problem away. What do you do then?
That question is very difficult because it then depends on the person. If you were utterly alone, what would you do? And I don't mean fake aloneness where you think you are alone, but you truly have people there helping you out and you just forget them; I mean when something happens where you can't even talk to any of your friends because either you can't tell them, or they refuse to listen or are not in a capacity to listen, and you also can't talk to your family because they are otherwise distracted and won't come to you for anything. What do you do when you are literally alone and a hard problem is thrown in your face?
And if you say turn to a topic you enjoy and work on it, such as a hobby and such, then let me add a stipulation. Pretend you don't have a hobby, that most of the time you just sit there and do nothing with your life. That in fact there is no point to your life and that only your computer would miss you if anything were to happen because they would miss you typing on them. The warmth of your fingers, the way they land on each key at almost the exactly same spot each time, the repetition of key hitting speed that does not change and can therefore sustain a liveable environment; your computer would miss you. But the problem would still hit you, head on. How do you deal with it?
Would you just dismiss it and hope it eventually goes away? Is letting it stand there staring at you an acceptable form of dealing with the problem? Is yelling at it at the top of your lungs helpful in the situation, causing a brief moment of insanity?
Lonely,
-Aram the Garmo
I think life can sometimes be a funny thing. We begin our lives attached to one person, literally. We eat, breathe, drink, think, and do everything this other person does. We don't even know it until a few years later, but this person is our mother. From here we are attached to a unit called a family. This unit in most cases consists of a mother, a father, and occasionally siblings or grandparents. From here on you are considered part of a family and your every move is noticed. Every sound you make is heard, every step you take is stared at, every time you touched something you were glared at; everything was noticed. You had a whole family with you; you were not alone.
You slowly grow older and you become aware of everything you are doing. You go into a form of the real world called school. In school you realise there are other people in your age group! For some reason or another you choose others like you that have similar tastes. You call them your friends and you start to do everything together. Whenever your family wasn't there, your friends were, and vice versa. You always had somewhere to be with you; you were not alone.
Eventually you start growing hairs in unexpected places. The grownups call it puberty, but you call it awkwardness. Some get acne, and some get breasts. It is an awkward time, and so you begin to withdraw. At the same time you also begin to realise that you are your own human being and start to become unique. Usually you would rebel against your parents, and have friends doing it too. You start doing everything with your friends, and when you are home, you are secretly wishing you are back with your friends. Your family keeps wanting to stay in your life, but you push them away and keep only your friends, but as long as you have your friends, you are not alone.
From then on, you keep your friends for a while. Sometimes you may lose them all and go back to your family for support. Your family will take you with open arms. Sometimes your family rejects you and so you stick with your friends, who take you with open arms. In either case there is a form of humans that stick by you. They are the people you turn to in case of problems, questions, and other such things that may arise; you are not alone.
The question becomes, what happens if somewhere along the line this system fucks up? What happens if you are desperatly, and utterly alone, sometimes literally. When alone, the world sucks. It doesn't matter what the world throws at you, there is only you behind the bat. If it's something simple then you are easily able to get back on track and keep going. On the other hand if it is something large and unavoidable, then you have problems. Being alone there is no where you can turn for support, there is no helping hand for guidance, there is no one standing behind you helping with the bat. And due to this you may not be able to swing hard enough to hit the problem away. What do you do then?
That question is very difficult because it then depends on the person. If you were utterly alone, what would you do? And I don't mean fake aloneness where you think you are alone, but you truly have people there helping you out and you just forget them; I mean when something happens where you can't even talk to any of your friends because either you can't tell them, or they refuse to listen or are not in a capacity to listen, and you also can't talk to your family because they are otherwise distracted and won't come to you for anything. What do you do when you are literally alone and a hard problem is thrown in your face?
And if you say turn to a topic you enjoy and work on it, such as a hobby and such, then let me add a stipulation. Pretend you don't have a hobby, that most of the time you just sit there and do nothing with your life. That in fact there is no point to your life and that only your computer would miss you if anything were to happen because they would miss you typing on them. The warmth of your fingers, the way they land on each key at almost the exactly same spot each time, the repetition of key hitting speed that does not change and can therefore sustain a liveable environment; your computer would miss you. But the problem would still hit you, head on. How do you deal with it?
Would you just dismiss it and hope it eventually goes away? Is letting it stand there staring at you an acceptable form of dealing with the problem? Is yelling at it at the top of your lungs helpful in the situation, causing a brief moment of insanity?
Lonely,
-Aram the Garmo
Monday, April 14, 2008
Last day in Paris (Part 3 of 3)
So today is the final installment of my trip to Paris! And luckily, it is short. I'll be uploading pictures and such on my facebook tomorrow, so stay waiting for those! I also have a lot of pictures on my photobucket site if you want to see those. For those you only need to go here. Almost all the pictures from the past few posts are on there, but hopefully I will be adding a couple extra. I will also put them on my flickr account for those who have that. You can find me on flickr at http://www.flickr.com/photos/crazyinsanoman/ And also, once again, I have made it so each of the pictures you can click on and get a bigger version. But enough of all that crazyness, let me begin with the last half of my journey! So we left off last time Sunday midday. I had just finished the Louvre and was meeting up again with Steven. Steven had spent all day at the Paris Marathon. So in honor of Steven's trip I included one of his 60 photos of the marathon. I call it 'the gay marathon runner.' I wonder if one day I'll ever have the ability to run a whole marathon. One can only dream.  Well anyway, afterward we decided we were going to go and try and find the gay district in Paris. After walking a while, we were finally able to find the gay street in Paris. It was very cute and cuddly and pretentious. It was also VERY expensive. One can of Red Bull cost me 5.20 Euros. Almost $8 for a can of Red Bull! Anyway, so that night we decided we would go to a gay restaurant in Paris. I decided we would go to 'Le Gai Moulin' because it looked gay, and served traditional French food. Of course I went all out on this meal. I ended up eating escargot for appetizers. Escargot is actually really good. I thought it was going to be slimy and gross, but it turned out to be really really good. And the sauce it came in was a mint garlic sauce that was to die for. For Entree I had duck in orange sauce, which I'm pretty sure was my first time having duck before. And for desert I think I had a souflee. I had so many deserts in Paris I can't keep them straight anymore. The dinner was amazing though! And it only cost around 21 Euro for the whole meal. A bargain I say! | ||||
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  So of course most of my shopping consisted around the Champs Elysees since I am just that type of person. I loved this street because it felt very much like the shopping area I would love. It is high fashion and I wish I could afford most of the clothes there so that I can look amazing, but unfortuantely the money does not grow on trees. I did end up going into the Louis Vuitton in Paris though. It was so amazing walking into the very first Louis Vuitton. I ended up buying something for my mother and then it was funny how the staff finally looked all happily toward me. They treated me like royalty after that. It was sort of funny, but also very exciting being able to walk around and not being looked down on. | ||||
 So of course after buying presents for everyone in my family, we decided to go to the Sacre Coeur since we had sunlight left over, and Steven really wanted to see it. It was crazy fun getting there. It is one of the highest points in Paris and looks over the whole city. We walked up so many stairs to get there, but it was every step. The view was breathtaking. After getting to the top though we noticed that a heavy downpour was heading our way! So just in the knick of time we got into a coffee shop and ordered coffee. I ordered my most expensive cup of coffee ever. It cost me 6 Euro. Almost $10 for coffee! Crazy right? It didn't even taste worthy. There was too much chocolate and not enough Hazelnut. Either way, we waited the storm out and went back to the hostel to drop everything off before heading off to dinner which again would be in the gay district. So this time it was Steven's choice to choose the place we were going to eat. He decided to go to a Spaghetti joint that we had seen the night previously. It was actually really crowded and very entertaining. It was very gay friendly and the waitors were very hot. The food was actually really good here too, but this time we didnt have room in our belly's for desert. We ended the night by going to a different gay bar that night. We went to Raidd bar which was amazing! The drinks may have been expensive, but it was tons and tons of fun. First off the music was not very loud so that you could have a decent conversation with people without having to worry about your eardrums falling off. Secondly, halfway through the night they had a special treat for the visitors. On the side wall they had a plastic wall that you could see a room through. Well, around 23:30 a guy in underwear walked into the room and the lights came on. He started rubbing himself with something like lube and started taking a shower. Of course he was also teasing the audience, and eventually took his underwear off and we got to see everything. It was a nice point in the night because it seemed very normal to everyone in the crowd. The funny part was that later that night we saw the guy walking around in the bar. The only part I didn't like was that no one was dancing. But other than that it was good and I wish we could have stayed longer. We ended up leaving around 00:30 because we had to wake up at 6:00 in the morning to catch the train to get to the airport on time to get back home! |
Exhaustedly,
-Aram the Garmo
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Second day in Paris (Part 2 of 3)
So here we are at day 2 of Aram's crazy trip to Paris. Today's post will be even larger than yesterdays, if that was possible! But luckily, tomorrow should be shorter. Also, this time I have made each picture a thumbnail, so if you want to look at a bigger version of the picture just click on it! So I am starting on Sunday if that helps anyone :-p To the left is a picture of the photographer of most of these pictures, Me! So I hope you enjoy the workings of the marvelous and dasterdly Aram on his amazing and fantastical trip to Paris, Part 2! So we started our day bright and early at around 7:00! My personal goal was to leave the hostel around 8:30 so that we can be at the Louvre by 9:00. Unfortunately Steven was slow on the uptake and we didn't even get to breakfast until 8:30. I guess I shouldn't expect people to be able to get up really quickly in the mornings, at least as well as I can. So we finally got to the Louvre around 9:30 and the line was crazy long. There were around 100 people in queue just to get in. But somehow, the line was moving ridiculously fast. It took us only around 2 minutes to get in!  Steven took a really cool picture of a statue and a water fountain so that it looks like the water is pushing the statue up, so I put it up right here. These statues and fountains were everywhere around the Louvre which was really cool. I personally didn't know what each of the statues were, but they seemed to mean something significant. So the good part about coming this sunday is that the Louvre was free and so it was pretty full. It is free the first sunday of every month which is why I planned our trip around this weekend. It turned out to be the weirdest weekend to choose to come to Paris as you will find out tomorrow. So if you ever plan on going to the Louvre, make sure to go on the first sunday of the month! It may be crowded but then at least you aren't paying 15 euro just to get in. | |||||||||||||
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 Now I am moving on to paintings. The picture to the right shows where most of the paintings I enjoyed were. That whole corridor is 1 kilometer long and is full of Italian paintings. I personally enjoyed Italian paintings the most, especially when they didn't have to do with Jesus. It's sort of funny how a lot of paintings have a lot to do with christianity. I am more of a greek fan but there were some cool Christian paintings. So here are all the paintings I liked. Near the end there are 2 modern art pieces that I included followed briefly by my 3 favourite paintings. Again, most of these pictures are pictures that I personally liked, but I have a few more in my collection and there are countless more in the Louvre. | |||||||||||||
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