Busy Busy Bee!

I will miss you, bed. 

     This week has probably been the craziest week of my summer. I was supposed to move into my apartment on Wednesday, but stuff happened and that didn't end up working out. So I moved in on Saturday, yesterday. But in the midst of all this packing, moving, unpacking and reorganizing (stressful and busy on its own) I was attending a leadership institute at my university--so much fun, and a really great learning experience--then training for Orientation! The next time I have actual free time is after school starts: September sixth!
     It's going to be a crazy couple weeks. I am totally excited about what I'm doing, but I will need sleep sometime in the next couple days and it's not looking likely.

Superman!

     It's summer break. I am taking the time to laze about and watch television and I just rediscovered a show I loved back when I was a kid. It wasn't a cartoon (while I loved them too), or even a kids show; it was Lois and Clark: the New Adventures of Superman.
     I always loved how they're friends, how Clark has more of a character role than in the movies, and that someone other than his parents know that he's Superman. I didn't see the movies until I was in high school, so everything I knew about Superman was based on this TV series. It's kind of amazing how I could have grown up knowing so little about the quintessential American hero.
     I've made up for my ignorance since I discovered that Superman isn't the only one with a TV show: Batman, Wonder Woman, The Green Hornet, The Six Million Dollar Man, The X-Men, and Spider Man have been popular over the last few decades. While they're not always my first choice to watch, I prefer a superhero show to the dramas like Desperate Housewives and reality shows like Big Brother and Survivor.
     Lois and Clark is still one of my top superhero shows, and I'm thrilled that it's back on the air.

Just a thought....
Stephie

Sliding Doors and Alternate Universes

     I watched a movie the other day called Sliding Doors. Gwyneth Paltrow played the main character, a young Englishwoman who has been fired, but it's right after that when the two worlds separate. In one she makes it onto the tube (the subway) and meets a charming man, then reaches home in time to discover her boyfriend in bed with another woman. In the other she misses the train and is mugged on the street trying to take a cab home, she doesn't discover this other woman at all.

     From there the stories take two completely different paths. In the first, she befriends James (the charmer from the Underground), their relationship grows, she develops her own business, and life goes on. In the second she stays with the boyfriend working pointless jobs to support him while he writes a novel, and cheats on her over and over. 

     In the end the two lines re-converge, but it reminded me of Doctor Who and that got me thinking: What happens every time we make a choice? If it's a yes/no sort of choice and we choose yes, does a separate world split off where we chose no? 

     I'd like to think so. I guess my conception of time is a little strange, but I see time like a tree where the branches split into different paths, but where they touch you can still hop from one path to another. Some people view time like a one-way road. Other people see it as a river where choices create only one reality. And still even more people think that there isn't really a choice, that everything is pre-ordained. I kind of get frustrated by that viewpoint because it takes away the individual's ability to change, either for the better or the worse.

     If time is pre-ordained, does that mean that Charles Manson was destined to be a serial killer from birth? Or that Mother Theresa couldn't help but be the model of a saint? I don't like the kind of world that theory creates. It's a world where we can't hope to be better people, or accomplish anything through effort--it all depends on what was decided for your life. It's depressing! I like the idea that every time someone makes a decision, a little bubble appears off our universe parallel to their decision where somewhere along the line you could jump back into the other universe, change your decision, or merge the two. It's hopeful and opens a world of possibility.

Just a thought....

Stephie

SWAT Standoff

    So, a couple weeks ago I was driving home from dropping my sister off when I ran into a police roadblock. So I went around and tried to get home the back way and ran into half the neighborhood standing in the middle of the road. At this point I gave up, parked and walked the rest of the way home.
     I got home and shared the news, apparently they had heard some explosions. So, we looked it up--according to the paper's website there was a SWAT standoff. Apparently some guy beat up two women a couple weeks ago and escaped when the police tried to arrest him. Somehow he landed at his mom's place in our neighborhood, somehow the police found him, and everyone just had to stand in the middle of the road to watch them work.
     That night the SWAT team picked the guy up after filling the house with gas.
Justice is served!

Just thinking....
Stephie

Lucretia Borgia

     Long ago, in a far away land called Italy there lived a countess. Lucretia Borgia was a countess best known for poisoning the people around her.
     Her family was from Spain, and contained Popes, a saint, and the model for Machiavelli's Prince. Lucretia was the illegitimate daughter of a Pope. She was well-educated and twice-engaged by the time she was eleven. She eventually married an illegitimate prince in a massive ceremony.
     After a few years the family no longer supported Giovanni (her husband) and forced an annulment. She next married Alfonso of Aragon who is attacked and killed a few years later. Lucretia is devastated and marries for a third time to Alfonso of Ferrara, her final husband. They manage to make a partnership of it and she becomes more respectable.
     When her family fell from grace, Lucretia survived the scandal and became even more respected. All around her, people were falling like flies, but Lucretia made it through everything safely. While she is supposed to be the heartless murderer, it is her brother and father who poisoned the men around Lucretia.
     But why does everyone remember Lucretia Borgia as an evil poisoner? I hadn't ever heard of her brother or father until I decided to look further into her life, instead I'd heard that she was a princess of an Italian principality and a black widow. I recently learned from my brother that she's featured in the Assassin's Creed video game (and follows the stereotype of femme fatale). Where did all the mystery come from? and why doesn't someone debunk the perception?

Just a thought....
Stephie

Gettysburg--A Battle Over Shoes?

     So, in addition to the "Stuff Mom Never Told You" podcast I listen to, I listen to "Stuff You Missed in History Class" and I ran across their Civil War Series. The first episode is about the Battle of Gettysburg.
     Now for anyone who doesn't know, Gettysburg is considered the turning point of the American Civil War. Confederate General Lee had been moving further and further into the North when he came upon the Union Major General Meade near Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. It is also the battle with the greatest number of casualties in the war. The battle took place July 1-3 in 1863.
     It's kind of funny how it all started; Lee needed shoes for his men and heard there was a stockpile to be had in Gettysburg. The two generals of the Union and Confederacy didn't know where the other was so the entire battle was a coincidence and started because of shoes.

Just a thought....
Stephie

Glasses...

     Lately I've been getting headaches when I read (not fun for someone who loves their books as much as I do), so I decided to make an appointment with the eye doctor. It went well; they've decided that I've got good vision, the only problem is that my eyes work too well together.
     A normal person's eyes sit angled slightly away from each other when they gaze into the distance. Mine don't, they angle slightly toward each other. That'd be okay, but when things get closer your eyes point closer together to meet in the middle on the object. To compensate the lens within the eye tightens or loosens up to focus on the object. Where I start having trouble is that the lens in my eye wants to focus at the same rate as everyone else's eye (over-focusing) while turning in further. This causes eye strain and then headaches the longer I read.
     To help out with this, I have to wear glasses. The glasses help the lenses in my eyes relax to focus at the same point as someone who doesn't have the same "over-cooperation" problem my eyes have. The optometrist explained that the +1.00 on glasses means they force the lens to relax, and the -1.00 makes the eye tighten and focus. I've been wearing reading glasses for about a year now, much shorter than my best friend's fifteen years or my mom's thirty-some years, but now I get to wear them any time I'm reading or focusing on little things, or really anything up close.
     So far, it's helping. I've been on the computer for a couple hours and before that I read my book and I still haven't gotten a headache, whereas without the glasses I'd have a full-fledged, nap-requiring headache. I'm just a little wary about having to carry them around with me and worry about scratching the lenses. Oh, well... I'll figure it out eventually.

Just a thought....
Stephie