Spoiler Alert: I Still Don't Have A Niche

Blogging advice sites and Ryan's mom have suggested that I find a niche for this thing. As if it's so easy to just choose a passion and then write about it twice a week until the end of time/the end of the Internet/the end of this life-chapter.

My thought process, distilled and rearranged into something pseudo-normal, has been approximately as follows:

I must have a passion. I'm a passion-having sort of person. I probably have so many passions that if I chose to write about just one, I'd start to miss the freedom to write about the other things, and then where would I be? I'd be unenthusiastically writing about passion A because I came up with a wonderful post for passion B which will never see the light of day. I just can't do it.

Of course, if that were true, you'd think all these posts about various passions would just keep coming to mind and I'd never be at a loss for blog topics.

Well, let's get specific. I like writing. That's almost a passion. I'm passionate about God. I like Leverage. I like tech. I like fantasy and science fiction. I'm interested in smart people and puzzles and smart-people things. Politics? No, I got jaded a while ago. At my old, old age of 20. Maybe I could write about nerdiness. Nerdyness. Nerd-ness. Or I could devise a goal, Julie and Julia style, and write about that. Just completely upset everything that my readers have been expecting for so long...which is, I suppose, to expect exactly nothing in particular and take what shows up. Maybe they like that.

I can't write about writing. That's too meta. I could write about God, the Bible, and Christian topics, except it's already being done all over the Internet, and by people who know better than I do. Anybody who wants to read regular posts of that nature hardly even has to step out into the Internet. So that's no. Politics is about eight times as "no" because it has a similar problem and also I hate it. Maybe tech, except that Gizmodo would make anything I do feel laughably piffling. I don't have any insiders who could give me bleeding edge tech for subject matter, and I have no way of coming up with truly new topics on my own. And with tech, if you're not new, you're essentially pointless. Or nostalgic. I could blog about old-fashioned things.

I could turn my blog into an outlet for short stories of the science fiction and fantasy variety. Ha. If I could come up with two of those per week, I'd be trying to sell them to magazines or compile a book so I could actually get paid for writing.

I could write a blog about Leverage. "This week's post will compare The Rashomon Job with Memento and the original Rashomon, and will discuss it in the context of nonlinear storytelling." This is starting to sound like a good idea. I'd better stop.

Maybe if I had a project, I could blog more easily. Why am I even blogging? Mostly for writing practice, and to prove that I can regularly write on a constant deadline for a long time. And because I get ideas for things and want to share them somewhere consistent.

Look at that bottle of white-out. I don't use white-out very often. Probably because I don't handwrite things very I COULD BLOG ABOUT OFFICE SUPPLIES.

Mercenary - A Poem

I wrote this poem while I was a counselor at Youth Camp this summer. I haven't posted it yet, and I would like to share it with you now.

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Mercenary

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The Prince, advice for despots, gives a word for hiring swords
Hire not one mercenary, for they'll take no man as lord
They will fight for any creature that provides them with a wage
They should not be trusted - this is what is written on that page
But the Enemy I know is a strategic one indeed
He will hire any fool to make the Christian soldiers bleed
And few mercenaries ever become loyal to his cause
But he keeps them his by way of chains and claws
Oh, at first it seems he'll pay a prize of stately size and weight
And he'll tempt you with some smaller sins, so you'll accept his bait
So the Devil gains a soldier, though the man is not aware
Is he loyal? Well, the Devil does not care
For the smallest sin is helpful to the war against our God
Which is why the Devil's method seems to us a little odd
"Go ahead," he says, "and try be good, it matters not to me,
I still will gain by your hypocrisy."
I quit your camp, O Prince of death, yes, hereby I resign
I long instead to fight for only He Who Is Divine
My service ends, I'm finished here, I'll do no more for you
No, not alone, but Christ will make the words I say be true
I will not be your mercenary, Enemy, I will not be
I take my sword and leave you, Satan - I have been set free.

Portrait of a Floridian Autumn

The high temperature today is eighty degrees Fahrenheit, which means jeans and a long sleeves or I'll be chilly on the way to class, especially if I walk in the shade. I have lived here too long to find weather in the seventies warm anymore. But, it is delightful. It is perfect. After a few weeks of regular rain, heat, and humidity, the air is completely breathable again and has been for a few days. I hold my breath daily waiting for it to cease, for the sun to become painful again, for the air to gain its signature Floridian moisture and stick awkwardly to my skin so that I am relieved to be indoors. It hasn't happened yet. It will. It is only early autumn.

The moment the weather starts to cool down after a relentless summer, I start thinking about Christmastime. Soon, the temperature will stop its inevitable teasing fluctuations and stay truly cold for a couple of weeks. I'll be able to wear gloves and scarves and boots all the time. For now, I'll stick to sweaters and flip-flops, or t-shirts and fuzzy socks. Odd combinations for odd weather in an odd location.

The trees are staying stubbornly green, of course. Around December, a few will unenthusiastically turn orange, and I'll still wonder why the others don't try. It is hard now to believe that there are worlds to the north where nearly every tree bursts into the colors of flame, dropping leaves for adults to rake and children to crunch. I have seen it, I have lived in it, and it is still hard to believe because it has been so many years.

I won't pretend that autumn here isn't nice. The flowers last a lot longer here, and the weather can be delightfully surprising, alternating between warm sun and cool breeze. Since the rain has become far less frequent, we live under a sky of dauntingly endless blue. We still have Halloween, Thanksgiving, and the new school year - all very important staples of autumn. I just wish the seasons would be a bit more obvious; I am not a fan of their of subtlety.

On Suspense and Solid Stories

"Of course, I'm being rude. I'm spoiling the ending, not only of the entire book, but of this particular piece of it. I have given you two events in advance, because I don't have much interest in building mystery. Mystery bores me. It chores me. I know what happens and so do you. It's the machinations that wheel us there that aggravate, perplex, interest, and astound me." --the narrator, Death, in The Book Thief

The book I am currently reading, The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, has a particular quality that I adore. Not only does it not rely on suspense, it deliberately flouts it. It tells you that something will happen, and then it deals with the details of it later. My first taste of a book that did this was Slaughterhouse Five, which completely throws suspense and linear story out the window. Among other things, the narrator keeps pointing out that someone named Edgar Derby eventually gets shot to pieces. The first time it is mentioned I found it almost appalling, but it soon became meaningless, almost humorous. Vonnegut regularly refers to him as "poor old Edgar Derby" as if the only thing that matters about his character is the fact that he eventually gets shot to death, and yet, as if the death hardly matters at all.

People generally like to avoid spoilers. I understand this to a degree. I have seen Fight Club, after all. The first time you see it, if you don't already know the twist, you see the story one way and receive a tremendous surprise. The second time you see it, you see the exact same story in a completely different way. It is a story well-crafted. However, there are plenty of cases where the so-called "spoilers" are essentially worthless, in that they don't change the preceding story at all. Consider my experience reading Harry Potter.

I wasn't allowed to read Harry Potter when I was younger. By the time I was in high school and the sixth book was out, my parents didn't care anymore and I was finally curious enough to try the series. I was still in the first chapter of the first book when my dear friend Casey said, "Oh, you're reading Harry Potter? In the sixth book, Snape kills Dumbledore." I didn't know who either of these people were, and by the time I did, it still didn't affect the story preceding the event. Poor old Dumbledore. But it didn't make a difference that I knew it was coming.

One of my main troubles with stories that rely on suspense, or that rely on the audience not knowing something, is that I like to re-read books and re-watch movies. If I like a story, I want to experience it again. Yet, if the foundation of the story is the element not known, then I can't possibly enjoy it a second time, unless I am a profoundly forgetful person.

Therefore, what I seek is the story well-crafted. I seek a story with good characters and with jokes that still make me giggle when I hear them for the thirtieth time. I seek a story with layers and small details, things I might not catch the first, second, or fourteenth time. I seek a story that takes place somewhere I'd like to go and can't, like Narnia or Middle Earth. I seek a story that tells the truth through fiction. I seek a film that is beautiful or a book that evokes beautiful images. I seek the stories that still come to mind even when I haven't read or watched them in ages. I seek solid stories with a solid foundation.

Of course, there are many things besides suspense that can destroy a story, for me. If it is told poorly, if most of the characters are awful, or if I can't relate to the premise, I likely won't be interested. But the issue of suspense, of the story that focuses on the end instead of "the machinations that wheel us there," is an issue that can bring any otherwise-decent story to its knees.

The Human Rest Requirement

I find myself willing to contend that, when we have a lot of work to do, we need to take breaks and yet we don't need to take breaks.

I realize this makes little sense thus far. Do kindly humor me until I have explained.

Some time last weekend I had the awful realization that the list of things I had to do this week was monstrous. There were tests, there were assignments, and there were things to do for the club I run on campus. I decided that the best way to deal with the problem was to schedule my entire week, Monday through Saturday, to within a precision of half an hour, and then follow that schedule exactly.

It worked perfectly until I started to feel burnt-out. I had allowed myself about half an hour for each meal, and eight to ten hours of sleep each night. That seemed like enough rest, and I wasn't sure why I was feeling so fatigued. More baffling was that this occurred about mid-Tuesday.

I faced two major options: take a break, or suck it up and keep going like this for the rest of the week.

So, I watched an episode of Leverage, thereby giving myself a forty-five minute break for something frivolous and enjoyable. I then skipped an unnecessary class to do something more useful, and my productivity rose through most of the evening. I was also much happier.

Through the rest of the week, where I found myself finishing items early, or when I realized I'd allotted much more time for something than I would need, I permitted myself to cease working for a bit so I could watch shows or read books or otherwise chill out. My productivity and general mood were likely much higher as a result.

So, we need breaks. At least, I need breaks.

I also know that we can't always afford to take a break. I thought I would have literally no time this week, and I was wrong, but if I'd had just one more assignment due, I probably would have been in that situation. The other side of this human rest requirement is that we often can continue longer than we thought possible.

That is, we do not actually need breaks nearly as often as we think we do.

If I had pushed through Tuesday, Wednesday, and the rest of the week without a legitimate mid-day hour of uselessness, I probably would have been fine. Productivity may have decreased as I continued to fatigue, and I may have become quite unpleasant to deal with, but I would have survived. At some point, I might even have gotten used to it. However, if I kept going, I'm fairly certain I would have gone insane. I haven't tested the limits of this and I don't intend to.

So my point, I suppose, of this end-of-the-week stress-dump, is this:

1. You do not need breaks as often as you think you do.
2. You do need breaks more often than never.

Have a good week and see you on Wednesday!

The Fro-Yo Trend

I love frozen yogurt. I love it even better when it's self-serve, costs under 50 cents per ounce, is available in multiple flavors - at the same time - and has a ridiculous amount of possible toppings, which you can apply yourself. If you somehow haven't tried one of these magical fro-yo places, which seem to be appearing everywhere, you should. Right now. I'll be here when you get back.

Have you gone yet?

I was introduced to this phenomenon over the summer. One day, my mom sent me a text message that said something to the effect of, "There's a new frozen yogurt place called Redberry. It just opened today and they have free samples. You should go check it out." I wasn't really planning to go, but my boyfriend and I had nothing to do, and we went. The deliciousness, the wide selection, the low price, and the modern decor left me amazed. Redberry, I wondered, where have you been all my life? Apparently, one of the selling points for frozen yogurt is that it also has health benefits. I think that's because it makes you smile.

Later, I saw something come up in an ad on Facebook that said, "Pinkberry coming soon to Orlando!" Pinkberry? I thought, Is that like Redberry? Are there more of these wonderful places? When I arrived back at college at the beginning of this semester, I flipped through one of the student-targeted coupon books and counted coupons for four different fro-yo places in the area. When in the world did all these fro-yo places show up?

The first one around here may have been iKiwi. I had seen it, and heard about it, but I never had a reason to go in. If I had known what wonders lived inside, I could have asked so many friends to meet for yogurt instead of for coffee. At least I can do that now.

Of course now, there are others. The only one I've tried so far, besides Redberry, is Simply Frozen Yogurt, and it had the very same style establishment - that is, it was also very, very good. I still haven't been to iKiwi, nor have I tried Mochi, Mix, or Menchie's, but I will certainly try all of them if given the chance. As for Pinkberry, it turns out it isn't self-serve. Neither is Freshberry. That does not, however, preclude them from being delicious frozen yogurt experiences. If anyone is interested, I'll gladly do a follow-up on this blog post, with a little investigative journalism regarding which yogurt place reigns supreme.

There are quite a lot of them, though. I was fairly convinced they mushroomed overnight some time in June. After doing some research, it seems that it's actually old news in the other Orange County, and probably other parts of the country as well.

About three years ago - as in, just before the recession - fro-yo places started appearing all over the O.C. in California. Last year, places started closing. According to one article, it was because of the over-saturated market, the under-stimulated economy, or both. It is almost strange, then, that around the same time, my university's paper published an article about how the new craze was finally arriving here, with iKiwi. If you troll the news nowadays for Orange County, CA, regarding frozen yogurt places, you'll still see a mix of some places closing and other places making updates to what they do.

Remember back in 2008 when Starbucks, which really was everywhere, ended up closing a whole bunch of stores? Remember how you can still find them all over the place? The yogurt trend isn't over, either, and in Orange County, FL, it seems it's just beginning. Mmm.

7 Reasons Why Leverage Is An Awesome Show

My hands-down favorite television show is Leverage. I know it is my favorite because I like to watch at least one episode every day that I have time. I don't watch a lot of television, so this is incredibly unusual for me.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Leverage, the premise is as follows: Four professional criminals - a hacker (Alec Hardison), a grifter (known as Sophie Devereaux), a hitter (Eliot Spencer), and a thief (Parker) - are brought together for one job, and an "honest man" named Nate Ford is brought in to coordinate the job and to keep them in check. When it's over, they find they have a taste for working together, and they decide to find jobs helping good, average people whose lives have been destroyed by evil rich people and corporations. The average people can't do anything to save themselves, and the people who hurt them are usually outside the law for one reason or another, so the Leverage crew comes in to provide, well, leverage.

So why do I love it?

1. I'd hang out with all five main characters. Normally, in shows, books, and movies, there is at least one main character who is annoying, or hateful, or otherwise generally detestable. I like House, for instance, but I don't care for Taub or Cameron. Yet with Leverage, I'd go for coffee with any member of the crew, any time. I do admit, Parker is my favorite. She's a total weirdo.
   
2. There's minimal drama. The characters have a family-like dynamic, except they probably get along better than any normal family. Leverage isn't based on drama. Occasionally it hints at romantic tension between Nate and Sophie, or between Parker and Hardison, but it's a minimal aspect of the show - just enough to keep it realistic. This keeps the show focused on the jobs, instead of on "feelings" or whatever.
   
3. They switch roles fairly regularly. They all have "their" job, the skill that makes them useful to the crew - but sometimes, for various reasons, they have to switch jobs. Sophie wants to try taking Nate's place, or Hardison misses a flight and has to verbally walk Parker through the hacking, or they need a guy to be the grifter and Eliot takes the role. This job-switching keeps it even more interesting.
   
4. It's more than schadenfreude. Honestly, who doesn't want to see the bad guy get what he deserves? But often in the process of a con, they discover that a lot more people are getting hurt than their client, and that taking down the bad guy will actually save a lot of lives. They aren't just Robin Hood. They're also a sort of stealthy Justice League.
   
5. It's got humor, and not stupid humor. Leverage is a funny show. Besides the usual interaction between chill-guy Hardison and the high-strung Eliot, there's also the time Parker pretended to be Björk in order to infiltrate a studio.
   
6. The crew solves problems and puzzles on the fly. I'm a sucker for stories about smart, skilled people, and the crew is entirely that kind of people. If they find a wall, they make a door, or they go in through the ceiling. If their plan fails, they come up with a new one, even if time and physics are against them - for, as Sophie once put it, "chance does seem to bend itself to [Nate's] bizarre machinations." They come up with creative solutions to unexpected problems in minimal time, and that is, to me, the most exciting kind of show.
   
7. The characters have a bizarre kind of freedom. What makes their creativity possible is that they are essentially unhindered by the law. They don't have to think, "What am I allowed to do?" They only have to think, "What will work best here?" It definitely makes "thinking outside the box" easier, since they essentially removed the box by working outside the law. It's not a good idea for normal, real people, but it makes a wonderful television show.