I stumbled across this fascinating article in the New York Times Magazine about a school in New York City (of course, where else?) named Quest to Learn that uses video games as a central educational resource. There are so many different facets of life and education that the article directly and indirectly touches on, that this blog post will probably become over-long, but hey, where else am I going to post this?
What I want the reader to understand is that I'm not anti-video game. Dear God, the hours and hours I spent in the days before worries playing on systems from the Atari 2600 to the XBox 360. I also am not saying that a video game design course couldn't be integrated into existing curriculums and used interdisciplinarily to great effect. It's just that some of the ideas and philosophies driving the Quest to Learn school indicate what amounts to a scrubbing of all pre-21st century pedagogy in favor of funneling learning through video games.
Video games, essentially, teach us how to be more robotically functioning - greater response time! improved dexterity! increased peripheral vision! There has always been a decision-making function. In the great, old Atari game Pitfall it was, should I cross the lake by hopping on the croc heads or by swinging on that there vine? Decisions happen every day, nearly every instant, as physicists in favor of the infinite universes theory can tell you. So while video games can give us improved military skills and heap more decision-making on us, what they fail fundamentally to be able to teach us is the why in life.
Let's get to the thick of things. The article states, "In a speech given the day before the start of the 2009 G-20 economic summit, Eric Schmidt, the chief executive of Google, offered his own tacit approval, suggesting that playing video games, especially online multiplayer games, fosters collaboration, and that collaboration, in turn, fosters innovation — making it good training for a career in technology. 'Everything in the future online is going to look like a multiplayer game,” Schmidt said. 'If I were 15 years old, that’s what I’d be doing right now.'"
But that's just it, Eric - I'm not 15. Nor are about five billion other people on the planet. Just because video games are fun, and because there are grown-ups who find dealing with them easier than dealing with being a grown-up, does not mean that a diversion meant primarily for people who don't have responsibilities 18 hours out of the day is suddenly supposed to be all we ever do and see.
8.17.2010
Hamlet was deep.
To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? -
- who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought...
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? -
- who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought...
8.10.2010
The current crisis in American job searches.
So you all know how I feel about the job search process.
One of the featured articles on Yahoo today talks about companies strangely not being able to hire middle-level workers (since those were the jobs that were hysterically slashed when the economy took a fall). There are plenty of reasons offered in the article, and I'll let you read it if you want, but the best part about it happened to be the comments section. I'm not a huge fan of these comment sections returning, because so many people are legitimately amoral, racist, sexist, or just stupid, and I hated wasting my time reading past their garbage before and I hate it now. Fortunately, many of the comments for this article actually pertain intelligently to the subject.
People everywhere are angry at the current hiring practices companies have adopted. One commenter really preached it: "I don't want to hear another word from employers griping about not being able to fill positions when they do NOT give the common courtesy of letting candidates know that they have even received application information. They don't return phone calls, they don't want to be contacted, they don't want to pay a fair wage, they don't want to offer benefits, and they certainly don't want to come clean about any going concern issues."
How in the world has it become acceptable to completely ignore the online applications that are submitted, especially when it's most times the only method we have of applying? At my last job we got so many online apps and if we weren't hiring, there was no way to contact them and let them know. We just had to ignore it, delete it from the e-mail system. But the places that are hiring, that have put out ads on Monster and CareerBuilder and so on, can't they at least extend the courtesy of sending a form e-mail that says "thanks for applying"??
And they don't want to be contacted! I have submitted almost 18 online applications and only ONE gave me, in the process, a name and number for a contact. Everyone else - screw you, we don't want to hear from you, we don't give a shit about you.
Another complaint from a commenter was that positions are being eliminated and then combined at a lower salary. His former company laid off a slew of people, then started combining their disparate positions into one and put out ads looking for not only one person to do the job of three or more people, but to do it for much less pay. His theory is that it was done to keep padding the pockets of the top dogs - and it's hard to argue with that. But also...why are Americans being asked to keep taking lower-paying jobs? It should be obvious that employers don't want to pay us what we're worth anymore - that degreed people end up making $25,000 a year or less which is a CRIME - and then they sit around and contribute to articles complaining about how jobs aren't being filled.
I checked in with my temp agency today and the two or three positions they had available only paid nine or ten dollars an hour. I felt bad telling the lady that I just can't go that low, but after reading all the comments from the people at the article, I don't so much now. I have no savings, therefore I have to re-enter the work force in a place that allows me to become financially independent once again. And I won't apologize for that.
I wish I had a proper conclusion for this post, but there are no words to sum up how I feel at this point.
One of the featured articles on Yahoo today talks about companies strangely not being able to hire middle-level workers (since those were the jobs that were hysterically slashed when the economy took a fall). There are plenty of reasons offered in the article, and I'll let you read it if you want, but the best part about it happened to be the comments section. I'm not a huge fan of these comment sections returning, because so many people are legitimately amoral, racist, sexist, or just stupid, and I hated wasting my time reading past their garbage before and I hate it now. Fortunately, many of the comments for this article actually pertain intelligently to the subject.
People everywhere are angry at the current hiring practices companies have adopted. One commenter really preached it: "I don't want to hear another word from employers griping about not being able to fill positions when they do NOT give the common courtesy of letting candidates know that they have even received application information. They don't return phone calls, they don't want to be contacted, they don't want to pay a fair wage, they don't want to offer benefits, and they certainly don't want to come clean about any going concern issues."
How in the world has it become acceptable to completely ignore the online applications that are submitted, especially when it's most times the only method we have of applying? At my last job we got so many online apps and if we weren't hiring, there was no way to contact them and let them know. We just had to ignore it, delete it from the e-mail system. But the places that are hiring, that have put out ads on Monster and CareerBuilder and so on, can't they at least extend the courtesy of sending a form e-mail that says "thanks for applying"??
And they don't want to be contacted! I have submitted almost 18 online applications and only ONE gave me, in the process, a name and number for a contact. Everyone else - screw you, we don't want to hear from you, we don't give a shit about you.
Another complaint from a commenter was that positions are being eliminated and then combined at a lower salary. His former company laid off a slew of people, then started combining their disparate positions into one and put out ads looking for not only one person to do the job of three or more people, but to do it for much less pay. His theory is that it was done to keep padding the pockets of the top dogs - and it's hard to argue with that. But also...why are Americans being asked to keep taking lower-paying jobs? It should be obvious that employers don't want to pay us what we're worth anymore - that degreed people end up making $25,000 a year or less which is a CRIME - and then they sit around and contribute to articles complaining about how jobs aren't being filled.
I checked in with my temp agency today and the two or three positions they had available only paid nine or ten dollars an hour. I felt bad telling the lady that I just can't go that low, but after reading all the comments from the people at the article, I don't so much now. I have no savings, therefore I have to re-enter the work force in a place that allows me to become financially independent once again. And I won't apologize for that.
I wish I had a proper conclusion for this post, but there are no words to sum up how I feel at this point.
6.04.2010
Cottage.
Yesterday I told one of the twelve-year-olds that I wanted her to draw me a cottage. I gave her the specs.
Today I found this on the desk in my office:
Wouldn't it be nice if life could be like that just a little bit? "Here's what I want..." and the next day it's a reality, without blood, without sweat, without tears. Without rejection or missed chances or misunderstandings. Without waiting.
I was half-joking when I told her I wanted her to draw it, the little, cozy cottage in the woods, like in the land of hobbits. But because she is an Artiste - and, it's starting to look like, a really good kid - she drew it anyway.
That was the first thing I noticed about her almost exactly a year ago, when I first came to the center. Her potential for art, at such a young age, is possibly limitless. She does it all. Sketches, paintings; she did an entire spring mural on one of the walls in the classroom using construction paper and magazine clippings. She fitted dolls with new clothes using the fabric scraps on the art easel. She made a papier-mache pinata out of the blue one day. She cut out the most elegant snowflakes to hang from the ceiling last winter, and decorated them with glitter. She drew scarily accurate caricatures of the other students on the computer using an old drawing program. She made an entire safari of animals using play-dough.
And what I love about it is that no one has to prompt her to do this stuff, ever. You just look up and she's either halfway through or already done.
Isn't is kind of amazing to think that every single person has their "something"?
Just imagine if we all got to do our "something" every day for a living. All of us.
Today I found this on the desk in my office:
Wouldn't it be nice if life could be like that just a little bit? "Here's what I want..." and the next day it's a reality, without blood, without sweat, without tears. Without rejection or missed chances or misunderstandings. Without waiting.
I was half-joking when I told her I wanted her to draw it, the little, cozy cottage in the woods, like in the land of hobbits. But because she is an Artiste - and, it's starting to look like, a really good kid - she drew it anyway.
That was the first thing I noticed about her almost exactly a year ago, when I first came to the center. Her potential for art, at such a young age, is possibly limitless. She does it all. Sketches, paintings; she did an entire spring mural on one of the walls in the classroom using construction paper and magazine clippings. She fitted dolls with new clothes using the fabric scraps on the art easel. She made a papier-mache pinata out of the blue one day. She cut out the most elegant snowflakes to hang from the ceiling last winter, and decorated them with glitter. She drew scarily accurate caricatures of the other students on the computer using an old drawing program. She made an entire safari of animals using play-dough.
And what I love about it is that no one has to prompt her to do this stuff, ever. You just look up and she's either halfway through or already done.
Isn't is kind of amazing to think that every single person has their "something"?
Just imagine if we all got to do our "something" every day for a living. All of us.
5.30.2010
You Lost Me.
So I raved about Christina Aguilera's performance on the Idol finale last week of a song off her upcoming album Bionic (due June 8). Even if you're not a fan, check out the song in the video below. I think it's crazy awesome and she is memsmerizing to watch; she interprets the hell out of that song.
As I've been replaying this song over and over the last few days, I wondered what genius had sat down at a piano and plunked it out. Found out last night - Australian singer/songwriter Sia, about whom I'm sure I've blogged at least once. Her last album, Some People Have Real Problems, came out in January of '08 and is fantastic; she's a little quirky, definitely has her own sound, and a serious set of pipes. "You Lost Me" has her stamp all over it. I'm stoked! I love it when a music collaboration comes out so right. I only have to wait like ten days to get the album version and that still feels like way too long.
(for some reason, sometimes video embeds mess up the comment link, so if you don't see it just click on the blog post title and it'll take you to the post's individual page with comment section)
Happy Sunday! I have absolutely nothing on my plate, so I might drive to Old Navy and try on some dresses; I wanna have at least one for my trip!
As I've been replaying this song over and over the last few days, I wondered what genius had sat down at a piano and plunked it out. Found out last night - Australian singer/songwriter Sia, about whom I'm sure I've blogged at least once. Her last album, Some People Have Real Problems, came out in January of '08 and is fantastic; she's a little quirky, definitely has her own sound, and a serious set of pipes. "You Lost Me" has her stamp all over it. I'm stoked! I love it when a music collaboration comes out so right. I only have to wait like ten days to get the album version and that still feels like way too long.
(for some reason, sometimes video embeds mess up the comment link, so if you don't see it just click on the blog post title and it'll take you to the post's individual page with comment section)
Happy Sunday! I have absolutely nothing on my plate, so I might drive to Old Navy and try on some dresses; I wanna have at least one for my trip!
5.21.2010
Why they lost.
ALERT! ALERT! American Idol post. :-)
I'm going to detail why each finalist, up to this week, did not succeed in taking the Idol crown.
12. Lacey Brown - I admire her tenacity, but though her voice was quirky, in the end it simply was not strong enough. No matter what, an Idol winner has to have a seriously strong voice, and she was never going to add that to her resume. Plus, her song choices were kinda bunk.
11. Paige Miles - every few years Simon has a moment of clarity, and I agree with him that she had one of the best voices in the competition. It's usually not good, however, to audition for the show because your co-workers want you to, or your mom, or whoever. You have to go in with a plan, and Paige simply didn't have one. In addition, she often looked dazed, as though she still wasn't sure where she was. And nerves were a problem also.
10. Didi Benami - my official favorite; she wasn't my typical fave, with obvious good looks and a heavy emotional side. But her super-sweet personality, killer voice, and strong stance against judge ridiculosity won me over. However, in this field of contestants, one true misstep was one too many. She took an excellent song choice and performed it as though a fourth member of the Dreams, complete with big curls and glittery gown. That simply wasn't her style. She should have gone acoustic and melancholy, and if unsure of the guitar work allowed, simply had guitarists join her onstage. I was broken to see her go, but at least there was one other person who I liked very well.
9. Andrew Garcia - his pretty awesome take on "Straight Up" during Hollywood week haunted him every week of live competition until he finally, I think, just gave up trying to please the judges. I think that in the end Andrew just wasn't as creative as we wanted him to be, and some very random missteps ("You Give Me Something," "Heard It Through the Grapevine") only added to the lackluster-ness of it all. Very sad. Of course, it would have helped just a bit if the judges didn't insist on actually reminding him of "Straight Up" during every single critique.
8. Katie Stevens - another one of the top voices. Yet strangely, she was far better during the audition rounds than live. She does have a short history of pageants, and that perhaps lent to her performances feeling less than organic. She never really felt the groove, never really let the audience close to her. The facade never cracked. It's hard for someone to gain voter sympathy that way. And so, they stopped caring. I would like to note that I think it's freaking awesome she can speak Portuguese.
I'm going to detail why each finalist, up to this week, did not succeed in taking the Idol crown.
12. Lacey Brown - I admire her tenacity, but though her voice was quirky, in the end it simply was not strong enough. No matter what, an Idol winner has to have a seriously strong voice, and she was never going to add that to her resume. Plus, her song choices were kinda bunk.
11. Paige Miles - every few years Simon has a moment of clarity, and I agree with him that she had one of the best voices in the competition. It's usually not good, however, to audition for the show because your co-workers want you to, or your mom, or whoever. You have to go in with a plan, and Paige simply didn't have one. In addition, she often looked dazed, as though she still wasn't sure where she was. And nerves were a problem also.
10. Didi Benami - my official favorite; she wasn't my typical fave, with obvious good looks and a heavy emotional side. But her super-sweet personality, killer voice, and strong stance against judge ridiculosity won me over. However, in this field of contestants, one true misstep was one too many. She took an excellent song choice and performed it as though a fourth member of the Dreams, complete with big curls and glittery gown. That simply wasn't her style. She should have gone acoustic and melancholy, and if unsure of the guitar work allowed, simply had guitarists join her onstage. I was broken to see her go, but at least there was one other person who I liked very well.
9. Andrew Garcia - his pretty awesome take on "Straight Up" during Hollywood week haunted him every week of live competition until he finally, I think, just gave up trying to please the judges. I think that in the end Andrew just wasn't as creative as we wanted him to be, and some very random missteps ("You Give Me Something," "Heard It Through the Grapevine") only added to the lackluster-ness of it all. Very sad. Of course, it would have helped just a bit if the judges didn't insist on actually reminding him of "Straight Up" during every single critique.
8. Katie Stevens - another one of the top voices. Yet strangely, she was far better during the audition rounds than live. She does have a short history of pageants, and that perhaps lent to her performances feeling less than organic. She never really felt the groove, never really let the audience close to her. The facade never cracked. It's hard for someone to gain voter sympathy that way. And so, they stopped caring. I would like to note that I think it's freaking awesome she can speak Portuguese.
4.25.2010
Simple things.
It's funny the things we don't remember after we grow up. Like helicopter seeds. They fall from maple trees in the springtime, and whirl and spin their way to the ground like the vehicle they predate by, surely, millions of years.
I had not given one thought to helicopter seeds since I was a child; so, fittingly, I was with children last week when there they were, once again, in my plane of existence. And how is it that I could go so long without even remembering seeing them? Surely they fall every spring. Is it really possible that I was so caught up in the to-and-fro expected of me that I never really saw them? Or that I simply looked right past them? I don't know which is worse.
It was a sunny and lightly windy day, a Wednesday, and as the kids ran and tried to snatch the seeds right out of the air, I stood up and watched the scene. There was a veritable canopy of trees overhead, broken through here and there with the blue and white of sky, and the seeds falling reminded me of butterflies, the way they take flight at the simplest sound and fill the air with their beating wings; except the maple seeds flutter downward fearlessly, unlike those butterflies who are going ever upward and away.
When a good wind would blow, the kids and I would stop what we were doing and race in their general direction, and leap up and try to catch as many as we could. A simple task and infinitely engaging. And I found myself wondering, as I do more and more, why the world must be composed of moments any more complex than this.
I had not given one thought to helicopter seeds since I was a child; so, fittingly, I was with children last week when there they were, once again, in my plane of existence. And how is it that I could go so long without even remembering seeing them? Surely they fall every spring. Is it really possible that I was so caught up in the to-and-fro expected of me that I never really saw them? Or that I simply looked right past them? I don't know which is worse.
It was a sunny and lightly windy day, a Wednesday, and as the kids ran and tried to snatch the seeds right out of the air, I stood up and watched the scene. There was a veritable canopy of trees overhead, broken through here and there with the blue and white of sky, and the seeds falling reminded me of butterflies, the way they take flight at the simplest sound and fill the air with their beating wings; except the maple seeds flutter downward fearlessly, unlike those butterflies who are going ever upward and away.
When a good wind would blow, the kids and I would stop what we were doing and race in their general direction, and leap up and try to catch as many as we could. A simple task and infinitely engaging. And I found myself wondering, as I do more and more, why the world must be composed of moments any more complex than this.
3.14.2010
Them's the breaks.
"Gather ye rosebuds while ye may
Old Time is still a-flying;
And this same flower that smiles today
Tomorrow will be dying."
~ Robert Herrick, British poet, from "To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time"
2.23.2010
This Week's Top Picks.
I wrote this as though I were being interviewed. So...yeah.
Movies:
Eve's Bayou "My favorite movie ever. It is absolutely, perfectly done, from the pacing to the cinematography to the mood of the time period. Jurnee Smollett's performance is masterful and should have been recognized by the Academy."
Terminator 2: Judgement Day "What I consider one of the best movies ever made. It's much more than an action movie and anyone who doesn't realize that is missing out on on so many amazing things. It actually took me years and years to realize there are three terminators in the film, not just two."
Forrest Gump "It always moves me to dwell on the contrast between Forrest's life--full of great luck and major events and success--and Jenny's, because her childhood abuse led her down such a sad, destructive path. I love how the story never shies away from how arbitrary life can seem."
Books:
Return of the Primitive, Ayn Rand "She was the perfect Aquarian! A woman who never shied away from stating her opinion loud and clear, who created her own philosophy (Objectivism), and who stuck to her beliefs and wrote passionately about the Truth at the dawn of the Postmodern era. This book of essays reflects all of that."
The Giver, Lois Lowry "This book is about a future utopia, and all that we had to leave behind in order to achieve and sustain it. It forces the reader to think about what they consider most important in life and society, and shows just how much diversity and chance are necessary evils. Really, really profound the way it's told. And, it's a 'children's book'."
Chaos and Harmony, Trinh Xuan Thuan "Interestingly, he never really shows how closely related the two things are, and only hints at how they are just different forms of the same thing. But he does his best to illiminute quantum theory, and even lends credence to the oft-discredited idea of Platonic forms."
Albums:
Trouble, Ray LaMontagne "One of those perfect albums, really atmospheric, intimate. A great folk-soul acoustic song-cycle. He may never top it, and hasn't so far with his subsequent albums (not for lack of trying)."
Neptune City, Nicole Atkins "This album has its own atmosphere, too, to the point where sometimes I get uncomfortable listening to it. It is so perfectly what it is. Somehow she updated mod '60s pop without ever losing the past, so it's this synthesis of old and new with original melodies that sound familiar the first time...it's so hard to describe what a wonder this album is."
Midnight Boom, The Kills "Dirty garage band-type rock played by a duo who are so hip it hurts. But as in-your-face and, dare I say, cacophonous as their music can be, I know one thing: they know what the hell they're doing."
Apps:
Unblock Me "This was the first app I got really addicted to. You have these wood blocks trapped in a square (your screen), and then there's a red block, and you have to move the blocks all around to get the red one through the little doorway on the righthand wall. It ain't easy. But the thrill of success is hard to match."
LineUp "Can't even explain how addicted I am to this. There are lines of little colored squares that keep getting added on to; you have to keep the lines from hitting the top of the screen. You can only tap areas of three or more of the same color to make them disappear. I really do feel like some poor animal in an experiment when I play this. But I can't stop."
Word Warp "You get a six-letter word, scrambled, and have to find all the words within it. If you don't find the whole word, you don't go on to the next level. For the lingual-minded."
Movies:
Eve's Bayou "My favorite movie ever. It is absolutely, perfectly done, from the pacing to the cinematography to the mood of the time period. Jurnee Smollett's performance is masterful and should have been recognized by the Academy."
Terminator 2: Judgement Day "What I consider one of the best movies ever made. It's much more than an action movie and anyone who doesn't realize that is missing out on on so many amazing things. It actually took me years and years to realize there are three terminators in the film, not just two."
Forrest Gump "It always moves me to dwell on the contrast between Forrest's life--full of great luck and major events and success--and Jenny's, because her childhood abuse led her down such a sad, destructive path. I love how the story never shies away from how arbitrary life can seem."
Books:
Return of the Primitive, Ayn Rand "She was the perfect Aquarian! A woman who never shied away from stating her opinion loud and clear, who created her own philosophy (Objectivism), and who stuck to her beliefs and wrote passionately about the Truth at the dawn of the Postmodern era. This book of essays reflects all of that."
The Giver, Lois Lowry "This book is about a future utopia, and all that we had to leave behind in order to achieve and sustain it. It forces the reader to think about what they consider most important in life and society, and shows just how much diversity and chance are necessary evils. Really, really profound the way it's told. And, it's a 'children's book'."
Chaos and Harmony, Trinh Xuan Thuan "Interestingly, he never really shows how closely related the two things are, and only hints at how they are just different forms of the same thing. But he does his best to illiminute quantum theory, and even lends credence to the oft-discredited idea of Platonic forms."
Albums:
Trouble, Ray LaMontagne "One of those perfect albums, really atmospheric, intimate. A great folk-soul acoustic song-cycle. He may never top it, and hasn't so far with his subsequent albums (not for lack of trying)."
Neptune City, Nicole Atkins "This album has its own atmosphere, too, to the point where sometimes I get uncomfortable listening to it. It is so perfectly what it is. Somehow she updated mod '60s pop without ever losing the past, so it's this synthesis of old and new with original melodies that sound familiar the first time...it's so hard to describe what a wonder this album is."
Midnight Boom, The Kills "Dirty garage band-type rock played by a duo who are so hip it hurts. But as in-your-face and, dare I say, cacophonous as their music can be, I know one thing: they know what the hell they're doing."
Apps:
Unblock Me "This was the first app I got really addicted to. You have these wood blocks trapped in a square (your screen), and then there's a red block, and you have to move the blocks all around to get the red one through the little doorway on the righthand wall. It ain't easy. But the thrill of success is hard to match."
LineUp "Can't even explain how addicted I am to this. There are lines of little colored squares that keep getting added on to; you have to keep the lines from hitting the top of the screen. You can only tap areas of three or more of the same color to make them disappear. I really do feel like some poor animal in an experiment when I play this. But I can't stop."
Word Warp "You get a six-letter word, scrambled, and have to find all the words within it. If you don't find the whole word, you don't go on to the next level. For the lingual-minded."
2.10.2010
When things go terribly wrong: Human Body Edition.
Lately I've been hearing about physical disorders that people unfortunately suffer, and it's pretty fascinating reading up on them. Granted, the reading is courtesy of Wikipedia, and I know that it's not the most reliable source, but then again, I'm not getting paid.
Today it was Kleine-Levin syndrome, dubbed "sleeping beauty syndrome." Read the wiki article here. Sufferers experience episodes anywhere from every couple of years to every couple of weeks. They will simply sleep the days away, some for as long as two weeks, only waking to eat, use the bathroom, and maybe shower. When they are awake for that precious hour or so, they appear spaced-out, childlike, and obviously sluggish. Some will exhibit a voracious appetite. Some will exhibit a voracious sexual appetite. All in all, it's a fascinating disease, one that usually appears spontaneously in the second decade of life and cures itself before old age. Doctors don't know why it happens - which always bugs me - but I want to learn more about this. I think we can actually learn a lot from it, from the behaviors exhibited when sufferers are in their waking mode.
A few weeks ago I heard that the son of a friend of a friend (sorry) had passed away due to complications from Prader-Willi syndrome. This disease usually claims the sufferers before they are twenty-one years of age. They have mild mental retardation, small hands and feet, are chronic overeaters and are, logically, oftentimes obese from a young age. Interestingly they don't actually die from the overeating, it's just a major symptom. Anyway, it's very sad that they must die so young.
(According to the Wiki article, the defect that causes Prader-Willi is similar to that which causes Angelman syndrome. When I read up on that, it was interesting to see that Angelman's is essentially a form of mental retardation--general happiness, a grasp of only the most basic skills, very late potty-training, a vocabulary of maybe five words, tops. It was interesting that the article never said it was mental retardation.)
You may have heard of Desiree Jennings, the "beautiful cheerleader" (they have to mention she's beautiful or, I guess, we won't feel sorry for her) who got the H1N1 vaccination and, ten days later, fell victim to dystonia. If you google her name you'll find videos. She suffers from chronic, manic muscle spasms that make it impossible for her move, let alone walk or perform the most basic daily functions. The only time she is able to move normally is when she is walking backward, or running. (Argh--think how much more we could learn about the human body just by studying why that is!) It even affected her speech. Now, I just saw a video today of her giving an update, and she was able to speak normally again (although she sounded very, very weary), and apparently she is being helped somewhat with treatment. It's not something that will ever go away, but she's not the only sufferer and there are things patients can try to get it under control.
Lastly, there are people who are actually born with no eyes. Specifically, no eye tissue. It's a condition called anophthalmia and while, in the video I saw, you can see this tiny, tubelike [pupil? retina?] just poking through the slit in the eyelids, essentially there is no eye there.
Sometimes I am just blown away by how intricate and fragile the human body is; how inconceivable that it all just came together on its own. (No complex machine/organism ever can) It makes it easier to understand just how quickly or early something can go wrong, though it doesn't take away the great sadness at knowing so many people in the world have to suffer.
Today it was Kleine-Levin syndrome, dubbed "sleeping beauty syndrome." Read the wiki article here. Sufferers experience episodes anywhere from every couple of years to every couple of weeks. They will simply sleep the days away, some for as long as two weeks, only waking to eat, use the bathroom, and maybe shower. When they are awake for that precious hour or so, they appear spaced-out, childlike, and obviously sluggish. Some will exhibit a voracious appetite. Some will exhibit a voracious sexual appetite. All in all, it's a fascinating disease, one that usually appears spontaneously in the second decade of life and cures itself before old age. Doctors don't know why it happens - which always bugs me - but I want to learn more about this. I think we can actually learn a lot from it, from the behaviors exhibited when sufferers are in their waking mode.
A few weeks ago I heard that the son of a friend of a friend (sorry) had passed away due to complications from Prader-Willi syndrome. This disease usually claims the sufferers before they are twenty-one years of age. They have mild mental retardation, small hands and feet, are chronic overeaters and are, logically, oftentimes obese from a young age. Interestingly they don't actually die from the overeating, it's just a major symptom. Anyway, it's very sad that they must die so young.
(According to the Wiki article, the defect that causes Prader-Willi is similar to that which causes Angelman syndrome. When I read up on that, it was interesting to see that Angelman's is essentially a form of mental retardation--general happiness, a grasp of only the most basic skills, very late potty-training, a vocabulary of maybe five words, tops. It was interesting that the article never said it was mental retardation.)
You may have heard of Desiree Jennings, the "beautiful cheerleader" (they have to mention she's beautiful or, I guess, we won't feel sorry for her) who got the H1N1 vaccination and, ten days later, fell victim to dystonia. If you google her name you'll find videos. She suffers from chronic, manic muscle spasms that make it impossible for her move, let alone walk or perform the most basic daily functions. The only time she is able to move normally is when she is walking backward, or running. (Argh--think how much more we could learn about the human body just by studying why that is!) It even affected her speech. Now, I just saw a video today of her giving an update, and she was able to speak normally again (although she sounded very, very weary), and apparently she is being helped somewhat with treatment. It's not something that will ever go away, but she's not the only sufferer and there are things patients can try to get it under control.
Lastly, there are people who are actually born with no eyes. Specifically, no eye tissue. It's a condition called anophthalmia and while, in the video I saw, you can see this tiny, tubelike [pupil? retina?] just poking through the slit in the eyelids, essentially there is no eye there.
Sometimes I am just blown away by how intricate and fragile the human body is; how inconceivable that it all just came together on its own. (No complex machine/organism ever can) It makes it easier to understand just how quickly or early something can go wrong, though it doesn't take away the great sadness at knowing so many people in the world have to suffer.
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