The Flip Slide HD

I've spent the majority of my day researching Flip cams. I finally decided I want the new HD Slide. It has double the storage, and it has a touch screen that allows you to essentially "slide" through your videos and display them. Basically, it's a really good quality HD video camera that fits in your purse.

This summer I will be visiting several countries-- Mexico, Belize, Spain, France, Monaco, and Portugal. I wanted to be able to document each country in a fun way. I'm envisioning a sort of "where to eat, where to go" kind of thing. My dream has always been to write about travel/food, so I figure a Flip camera is a perfect place to start. That and my being able to travel to so many awesome places this summer (which I'm extremely thankful for).

Please don't let me forget to blog about each city I visit. This is something I need to keep up with.

As far as life these days, many people are stressing about finals and the end of the school year. Yet, I'm finding myself unusually calm about the situation. Perhaps it's because I only have 1 test and then 3 finals, but I will have about a week to study. Nonetheless, summer is just around the corner and I'm ready for it.

Waves

Waves are such a go-to image for just about anything. I realized that today sitting in Electrical Engineering gazing at the sine wave on the board.

Friends. Friends come and go in waves. I've been telling my little sister that friends will be good friends and they'll be bad friends. You will be friends with some people for short periods in your life, and others will remain your friends for a lifetime. Even if they are your lifelong friend, there are waves of seeing them more often than other times. Have I confused everyone yet? As far as college goes, I believe the friends you make in college will be the ones you remember when you're 60 years old. Not to say that your high school or even middle school friends won't be your lifelong friends as well.

Music. I have waves of listening to music all the time and constantly exploring for new artists and quality music. Other times I prefer silence. There are days when I just want to listen to Bob Marley all day, other days I want to indulge in some horrible pop and hip hop music.

Thoughts. Is it just me? I wake up some mornings focusing all of my attention on worries and anxieties from the previous day. Trying to cast my worries and anxieties away, I think about getting rid of these thoughts, but no can do. Other days my thoughts are everything positive. There's nothing in my way, and I am on top of the world. I'll be walking down the road to get to class and I just thank God for my life and for how blessed I am to be attending a great school and be living in a wonderful place.

Is everyone seeing this "wave" trend?

Now, on to more important topics.

Body image. According to my Reporting II professor, a new eating disorder has been identified. I'm not sure what it's called, it's not orthorexia, but it has to do with being a health food junkie. This would be a healthy thing, right? No. In this case, the person is so obsessed with obtaining food that hasn't been processed and is completely and 100% organic, that if they can't find any, they will eat nothing. These health food junkie-arexics would eat nothing over a salad that may or may not have been slightly processed. Even scarier, food labels can say their food is organic if it's only 5% organic. Yep, those daily bananas you've been consuming could be 95% non-organic. Mmmmm chemicals.

Organic Food. I'm a huge advocate of eating green and organic. But I'm not obsessed. Just as a side note, I was at Whole Foods when I reached for a package of raw chicken, only to put my arm back by my side and said "Oh, it's not organic." An actual farmer with an apron approached me and handed me a different package of chicken that looked kind of fancy. "This is my company. It's completely organic. We give the chickens windows and we let them out to play when the weather is nice. We also feed them grains with no antibiotics, hormones, and pesticide-free grass." So that's what the difference is. The chickens are able to lead a happy little life and BOOM. They're organic.

--Nblank

I'm back...

So...I'm going to do a better job at posting my blogs hopefully daily, if not, every other day-ish. I go through my busy days always pausing for thoughts I never seem to be able to remember to write down. I wish Apple could come up with a device that read your mind and just sent those thoughts to your digital notepad. But then again, that could get you in a lot of trouble. Which brings me to the first topic:

The iPad. First off, who named this? I don't think it's a great name for what one guy standing next to me as we were testing them out called, "the world's largest iPhone." Indeed it is. And one thing I noticed is it encourages horrible typing skills. Sorry to all you keyboard and typing instructors. We will be now using our thumbs and pointer fingers to type. Goodbye typing skills. But, on the other hand, web browsing is super fast, unlike the iPhone. Be careful though. I accidently zoomed in on my email list and deleted an entire page. If you're commonly referred to as klutzy, clumsy, or a butterfinger, KEEP AWAY.

Technology. Ok, ok. I'm 20 years old and I can't exactly be the one to say "technology these days! My goodness!" But I'm going to anyway. Sitting behind a woman during church, the pastor begins to quote a Bible verse and she whips out her iPhone and diligently taps on the Bible app and goes straight to it. So I've been living in this 21st century too, but can we just take a step back and look at ourselves? Who would have ever thought this would be possible? You can turn your lights off in your home from miles and miles away with your PHONE. You can turn on Shazaam when you hear a cool new song playing and it tells you what that song is. WOW.

Microwaves. Has anyone ever sat and thought: why is a microwave called a microwave? Well I did the other day. And it makes sense, it just seems to be such an explicit definition of what the appliance is, such a formal name. Why not "the food zapper"? This is stupid, I'm going to stop.

Paddleboarding. Never heard of it? It's a water sport using a surf board and a paddle. You stand up on the board facing forwards with both feet and paddle yourself around. It's an awesome workout for your whole body and you feel like you're walking on water. Just a Hawaii thing? Just for the ocean? Nope, the Blankenship family has started a new trend on Lake Austin. Atleast, I'd like to think so.

College. You know, it's funny what some "college students" seem to make of their 4, sometimes 5 years at school. Yes, I said school, but some choose to take a different route. Why pay tons of money to go to a school like SMU (although, as I said, we pay more than Yale, but clearly don't make the academic cut like Yale does.) if you're just going to party every single day and groggily make it through class on your good days and just make poor grades. What's the point. Please. Feel free to comment. And don't think I'm saying I don't like to have a good time. Because I do. I'm not trying to preach here, just really thinking about why you would waste your time!

..I'm out.