Room to Think

Happy Florence Friday Everyone! This is my last post as part of the class--I'll continue posting on a regular schedule (fingers crossed)--and in it I'll detail what my final project for this blogging class is going to be. In essence, I intend to make my very own travel guide to Florence, and ultimately, Italy.  In fact, the book will be in two parts: I'm currently working on the first half: The travel guide.   I'm compiling a list of important dates  (like festivals , religious holidays, and special days that Museums aren't in operation) I have a map of the current locations of my favorite Italian car manufacturers. (based on my last Florence Friday post ) I have a basic map of Florence and Tuscany   It will most likely be folded-in, accordion style. (preferably with a star for my home, and a star for my school.) (More stars will pop up over the time I'm there too, I expect.) A map of transportation locations  busses, trains, bicycl...

Not an actual video.  They haven't posted it on youtube yet. Click  here  to watch it on TED.com This guy. His name is Andrew Stanton, and even though sometimes he sounds like he's reading off of a script, he's a storyteller from Pixar, and he uses this TEDtalk to share what the essential parts of a good story are. Since most of you in the class are creative writers, I feel like this is a good one for all of you.  Mr. Stanton here outlined some of the techniques we've learned in the last couple years and condensed them into a way that's easy to remember.  I'm not saying that I learned much more from him than I have from 4 years of learning to write, but I am saying that he connected some dots that gave me a nice "aha!" moment this morning as I watched this over my breakfast. I don't have much time to go into detail, but the title of the TEDtalk is "The Clues to a Great Story", and he uses a swear word in the first 3 minut...

Today I'm finally back in class again. (We had a week-long sabbatical from actually coming-in to class as Brenda was out of town.) And today, we're voting on Bloggies.   Bloggies are awards for the best blogs in specific areas--but we're choosing blogs from the Living Writer's Blogroll . Here's my ballot: (HEY! I THOUGHT BALLOTS WERE SUPPOSED TO BE ANONYMOUS!) Best Personal Blog : Chelsea Best Design/Visual Blog : Charity Best Hobby/Specific Interest Blog : Will Most Improved Blog : Tommy Most Interactive Blog : Natalie Most Likely to Succeed : Kacie And...now that I've turned in my paper ballot, these votes are final. Here's a secret: I wanted no more than to vote for multiple people under certain categories.  It really just wasn't fair. Best Personal Blog: Chelsea I thought Chelsea and Natalie and Charity were really tied for best personal blog.  In the end, I ultimately chose Chelsea's "When I grow up" because hers is...

You know, I missed last Sunday's Sunday Scribbles, and I didn't even notice.  That's how busy I've been.  I hate dead week (Lovely teachers, I think you have it backwards...Finals week is supposed to be more difficult than dead week. >.<) I really ought to rename this day "Sunday Stresses" or "Stressful Scribbles". I was going to post a picture I drew on Illustrator today, but it seems as though my computer is deciding to be a jerk again.  Three weeks ago my Microsoft programs all got corrupted and needed to be reinstalled, putting me behind in my work for my 402 class.  Just now, InDesign crashed and decided it was going to take the entire Adobe Creative Suite with it.  I'm supposed to send that project to my client for review tomorrow, and I don't have the disks with me for a re-install. Life is sucking at the moment.  I'll figure it out, though. =/ What I probably would have drawn if my computer had decided to work. ...

So...it's 2am and I just got into bed after leaving a wonderful party with some friends who don't hang out nearly often enough.  =)  I hope you all got home safely!  =P You know the rule--I haven't gone to sleep, therefore, it's still Friday, and I'm still doing Florence Friday, despite being rather exhausted.  My exhaustion spawns from the upcoming week, and all the things I need to finish for classes, not necessarily from the wee hour at which I am writing.  But that, dear readers, is a rant for another time.  Maybe I'll even include a list. For those of you who know me, you know that I got into cars because a boy I liked liked cars--I've acquired quite a few passions because of boys--specifically, this car.  The Lamborghini Gallardo.  I'm quite fond of it in orange, but I believe Jeffo would prefer his as a shade of white (it's a specific white, I can't remember), though he doesn't mind looking at it in other colors as well. H...

Happy Tuesday everyone! The 2012 Bi-annual TED conference started today! My facebook news feed and blogger reel have exploded with updates from TED, and it's great.  It also means I've spent close to three hours watching TEDtalks today.  It was wonderful and awful at the same time, because I know how much homework I'm putting off right now.  It's even worse that I can write off watching so many TED videos as "doing homework" for this blog. Most of the TEDtalks I've watched tonight pertained to dance, or music, or the arts.  They were brilliant, interesting, and captivating.  I even found that if there was a speaker involved with the dancing, or with the music-making, I was more prone to remembering what they were saying, even if the talks themselves were over 30min long. I guess there's an element of hybridity that's encouraged in TEDtalks.  We've moved beyond that phase of Orator + Powerpoint = presentation.  (thank god) TED en...

I suppose it's only fitting that today's Florence Friday be about The Italian Carnival, as it just ended on Tuesday. "The Carnival starts 58 days before Easter and ends on Shrove Tuesday (Fat Tuesday or Marte di Grasso, the day before Ash Wednesday." -Wikipedia It's been held (officially) in Venice every year since 1979.  The Italian government decided they needed to bring back Venitian history and culture, and Carnevale seemed like the best way to start. **So, Venice isn't Florence, but, it's close enough, right?** "Teatime" by Horst Raack It was voted 2012's La Maschera piu bella" (Best Mask) Supposedly this "Best Mask" contest is held in the last week of the Carnival and is voted on by a panel of international costume and fashion designers. I'm digging her hat.  Horst Raack also won in 2011 and 2009. There's also another fancy designer who won Best Mask three times as well: Tanja Shulz-Hess . ...