Random rant blog about computers. (not my class)

Okay, so I've come to the realization that it's not photoshop that hates me. In fact, its the computer. So you know my rant earlier, well, here's the thing, I've come to love photoshop again (except painting. still hate that. but whatever) and its because I found out why my file "wasn't" saving. Actually, it was, but not to the desktop like I though. I knew it kept telling me it saved.
So anyway, I did say it saved and it did. Only, it was saving to the temp folder even though I kept telling it to save to the desktop. Which is oh so frustrating since that's where all my missing documents went.

So yeah, we've come to the conclusion that it isn't actually photoshop that hates me but the computer itself. Which is still painfully frustrating. After all, I can't even find the temp file. So now I've come to hate the computer instead which hates me, just so you know. Because I know I set it to the desk top because all my other files saved there. So yeah, I already had a grudge against dell computers but its just growing. slowly but surely. After all, my first lap top broke five times. Not due to mistreatment but because they just don't like me or the makers didn't put it together right. But that doesn't even pertain to this time. This time, it just changes where I tell it to save. NONE of my other computers did that. which makes this frustrating. But oh well, I can deal with a few more days. At least my laptop now doesn't hate me. :)

Alright. Calm now. Now, I think you should watch this :)

Okay, so now that I'm calm, I'm going to start next weeks questions and then publish it on Sunday afternoon. Then I will have my 500 word blog done for the week and that work out of the way. Smart, right? So anyway, some of it might seem sorta rant-ish considering what it's about but anyway, on with the questions. Well actually, now that I'm reading the questions, nevermind. I haven't done some of the stuff for it yet.

So moving on, I guess I'll have to write about something else. Like a movie. My favorite movies. Now I have quite a few of these so I don't know why I didn't think of writing about them earlier. So anyway, some of my favorite movies are Blood and Chocolate (nothing like the book), The Break-Up, and Because I Said So. All are really really good movies. However, most of them I haven't seen in a while so bear with me if I mess up a little.

So Blood and Chocolate is about Vivian, a werewolf girl, although she is older in the movie than depicted in the book. But anyway, so sort of like in the book, she has lost her father, but unlike the book, she lost the rest of her family too. She is blames herself and since then has been preparing to run again if the need should ever arise. She is living with Astrid who is her Aunt in the movie (although not in the book. she is the villain in the book) and it is rumored that Gabriel intends to mate her for the next five years "as is tradition." However, she meets this graphic novel writer, Aiden and falls in love with him and the pack is against it and tries to separate them, first by trying to make him leave, and then by trying to kill him. As things get crazy toward the end of the book, some blood is shed, but whose you will have to find out by reading. After all, as you read in one of my last blogs (if you read it) not everything has a happy ending.

Alright, so The Break-up starts off, the couple "happily" dating and living together in a condo (I'm skipping over the very first scene for anyone who has seen this movie). And I say happily in quotes because you can almost feel the tension rising between the couple all through the first scene. And as soon as it snaps, things just go down hill from there. Each person is trying to prove that they are better off without each other because the broke up (as the title would give away). Only then it turns more into trying to make each other jealous until things just start getting to both of them and Brooke (the girl) finally decides to try and turn things around but its just too late. Things are too broken up. However, to find out whether this has a happy ending or not, you will have to watch the movie. I never ever give up the ending of books or movies.

And now for Because I Said So. I love this movie. It is so funny and so romantic at the same time. Its about this girl and her mom. Her mom is very controlling and her reason for telling her daughter to do things is "because I said so" or "because I'm your mother" or something along those lines. When her mother feels like her daughter is never going to get anywhere in her dating life, she decides to "fix it" for her by putting out an online add and picking a guy she thinks is good for her. The movie progresses and the daughter is dating two people; the one her mom found and another guy that "found her" but was actually someone from the dating service. However, the daughter doesn't know about the dating service until she finds out from the guy her mom approves of. For the rest of it, watch the movie :) Its really good and I'm not doing it justice.

And so for now I'm done I guess. These are some of my favorite movies. They all make me very happy. I suggest that you watch these. They are really really good.

Why I hate photoshop. Seriously, I do.

Okay, so you know what, I'm going to write about photoshop because I think that it is horrible. Truly and honestly, I thin k it is horrible. Not only do I think that painting with photoshop is irritatingly difficult, I think that it is just difficult in general, especially if you don't know what you are doing.

Now here's the thing, I probably wouldn't have a grudge at all against photoshop if it weren't for the fact that EVERY time I go to save something, it will tell me it's saved and then it doesn't. It is mildly irritating when following instructions on lessons. Those I can go back and find again. When I'm doing final projects though, like say...a collage, and yet again, it doesn't save, I get really, really mad. I don't even remember half the things I did and now I have to go back and do them again. Which probably won't matter since it won't save anyway.

So to address the other point of the painting, it really is just irritating. It is frustratingly long and, again, if you don't know what you're doing you are probably going to get really frustrated because it's not working. And honestly, even coloring wouldn't be so bad if it weren't so complicated. But seriously, they just keep improving photoshop and putting various brushes in with other ones and making them harder to find and stuff like that and making it harder for beginner users. And not only that, if it doesn't save, it doesn't matter whether you complete it. After all, you can't save it because the program has a freaking glitch.

And yes, this is a rant blog because I hate photoshop. Maybe its just my computer, but either way, the program doesn't work. It is horribily frustrating and I don't ever want to use it again after this although I'm probably not going to get a choice.

Good books, not so great movie. Oh well. (Not Twilight)

Okay, so first of all, just to get this out of the way, this has nothing to do with Twilight. I'm actually talking about Eragon and more specifically, the rest of the Inheritance series. I liked the first two books. The third book was definitely my least favorite one of the three and felt repetitive. If it weren't for the repetitive feeling and what felt like flashbacks, I probably wouldn't have had a problem with the book. In fact, it might have come close to being my favorite book. The only problem was that it came out so late. It left me hanging for too long and my interest faded in it somewhat which resulted in it taking a while for the book to be read.

But anyway, Eragon was favorite of the three books. I know, I know, its the first book, but acutally that has nothing to do with why I like the book. I not only had a hard time putting it down, but I had to re-read it because it had reached the top of my favorites list at the time. Honestly, I moved on to better books after that. But anyway, I actually had a favorite part of the book and that was Eragon's capture. I mean the one when the Shade had captured him and held him in the same prison as Arya (who is still my favorite character). I found that his conversation between himself and the Shade was both amusing and ironic and then the fight that ensued shortly after was also pretty good.

Over all, I just liked the book. I don't really need a reason to argue why so I'm not going to continue arguing it. But I did also like Eldest, the second book. I liked a lot of what happened then too like Eragon's training, his return to the Varden, and the discovery of what happened to his brother Mortag and who the last dragon rider is. I didn't have a particularly favorite part of the book but that's alright. It was still a pretty good book.

As for the last book, well, I already gave my opinion on it so I'm not really going to comment anymore as to the content of the book. I don't really remember much more than Eragon getting revenge and saving Sloan and his brothers wife (I think).

So anyway, that's what I have to say on the matter. Over all, a good series and hopefully the next book will be good too. So...yeah.

Just writing about whatever. Guess its another music review. Read. Listen!

Okay, so I'm really, really bored and trying to get some blogs up for class since this is one of the few things that doesn't seem to hate me right now. So I guess I'm going to blog about music. Again. Yay! Anyway, you would think that I wouldn't cry when listening to techno and dance music. Serious. And its my favorite song too.

Anyway, getting passed the fact that my life has turned into a sob story, I find that techno and dance music usually really lightens moods. I particularly like Basshunter and songs like All I Ever Wanted and Dota which are by Basshunter.

However, these aren't the only songs by Basshunter that I like. I've discovered that I also like songs like Boten Anna and Now You're Gone, along with multiple other songs. They are extremely good. It feels not just like something to dance to (particularly in the case of Now You're Gone), but that there was more of a point behind the song, but that's also how I feel about All I Ever Wanted.

I just recently found a lot more than the songs by Basshunter, which are also extremely good. There are also songs like My Heart Beats Like a Drum by ATC and I'm So Lucky, Lucky which are both good songs too. They have a great dance beat and allow for the listener to understand what the singer is saying in both songs, unlike songs like Dota and Boten Anna which are is Swedish (I think. I'm not certain though). And what I mean the listener being able to understand what is being said, I simply mean someone who only speaks English in this case.

I don't know...I guess you'll have to read ;)

Okay, so I didn't know what to write about earlier but I just had a great idea. I'm going to write about UB and how much I'm gonna miss it once it ends next week. I didn't really think I would miss it as much as I think I will now. UB has done so much for me in the last five weeks.

Since UB started, I haven't felt like I'm being criticized for every little thing I do and I haven't felt like I'm going to be told I'm a failure at life because I didn't do well at something. The people here are really supportive of the stuff I do and don't do well. And I say don't do well because they are supportive there too. What you don't do well in, the staff help you with fixing so that you will do better with it.

Not only that, but I've made some really good friends that I'm going to miss once UB gets out. I really hope that I will be able to keep in touch with them. My friends have also been extremely supportive when I'm having problems with either another friend or something else. But I haven't just made new friends, I've fixed friendships that fell apart earlier during the school year. I'm not going into the story and if that person reads my blog, they'll know who they are.

But anyway, I'm also going to miss the small classes and the set out schedule that UB has. I know that sounds weird if you know me because I hate schedules but I find the schedule making things easier in this case. Part of the reason that I don't like schedules are because they are usually too vague in how they are written (in my family at least.) and so I generally don't follow them. The UB schedule is fairly spelled out and it provides time for me to relax and do what I want to for a little bit which schedules at home don't allow for. At home it is always something that doesn't allow for free time which is another reason why I don't work by schedules at home.

But I already said what I'm going to miss most is my friends. So yeah, I love all you guys and I can't wait to come back next year.

hmmm. Oh, I Know!

Okay, so it took me a few minutes to remember what it was that I wanted to write about since at the moment I can't think of any particularly good books I've finished lately. But anyway, no, this is not a review. This is actually going to be about something I personally find fascinating as a movement in history.

The reason I find it so fascinating is that it applies to me (indirectly). I am a romantic. Now, those of you who don't know much about history would probably think 'okay...so you like romance?' and yes, that is part of it, but for those of you reading this I'm thinking more of the Romantic Movement as a whole, not just the romance aspect of it.

The Romantic Movement was a response to the Enlightenment which revolved around reason and intellectual thought only. Feelings weren't involved in the process of thought during the Enlightenment. Those kinds of ideals transferred into art and writing (the second part I’m not sure about) of that the Enlightenment period as well. The Romantic Movement, however, revolved around the human emotions and was more a social movement than a political movement, although it did have some political aspects to it.

The Romantic Movement affected literature, art and music mostly, although it did reach into things like plays too. In regards to literature, it started the Gothic Romance which targeted heavy emotions like fear and romance. Books written in this period are books like Jane Eyre, Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, and Frankenstein which are now considered great classics. It also affected plays play writes like Shakespeare in things like A Midsummer Night's Dream since it also focused on things like faeries and other fantasy creatures (like witches). In that regard, the Grimm Brothers also took in interest in old faerie tales and complied them into story books.

It also affected art. Art began to take form in romantic ideals by focusing in on nature. Nature was another thing that romantics took an interest in. Before the Romantic Movement, nature was considered dangerous but during the Romantic Movement, people grew to love nature, even though the Romantic Movement didn't go very long or far.

The third thing that was affected was music. Music became more individual instead of trying to please others. Famous composer of the Romantic Movement were Beethoven, Johannes Brahms and Schubert.

The Romantic Movement was dated back to the 1850's but in some regards, the father of romanticism was Jean-Jacques Rousseau. He was an Enlightenment thinker but he also gave regards to human emotion and to nature. Those thoughts set him apart from the other Enlightenment thinkers and put him closer to the romantics of the future who agreed with his ideals.

The Romantic Movement ideals were ideals that were strongly associated with the French Revolution which also took place at the same time as the Romantic Movement. However, romantics didn’t approve of the methods used after to control the people like extreme terror.

Photoshop Disaster

Okay, so week four of class and here it is this week's assignment; describing a Photoshop disaster and how to fix it if possible. So, I've chosen to use this photo of Beyonce and the disaster with it.

As you can see, whoever it was that tried to photoshop this picture forgot to do one thing and that was take one arm out of the picture. it might be hard to tell at a glance which arm it was without the focus being drawn to it with the red circle.

However, if you can figure out which direction the light was coming from, you could figure out which arm was the one that photoshop was used on. In this case, the light was coming into the photo from the left and so with her arms up, the light would havve caused a slight reflection from the left arm against the right one and you wouldn't have noticed the the sparkles on her dress. not only that, with her arm down on the right (in the photo) her body would have been blocking out a lot of the light reaching her arm and it wouldn't have glimmered as much.

A way to fix this would be to have the arm raised on the right removed. It would have been simple enough to do that by taking parts of the background and covering it in a way that would have looked natural. Not only that, but the person creating the picture might have considered fading the arm just slightly to give it a slightly more shadowed look.

Books Books Books :)

Keturah and Lord Death was a very good book. I found the book very easy to read and once I started reading it, it was difficult to put the book down. The book is about a girl (Keturah) who has wandered into a forest and is basically at deaths door. When Lord Death comes for her, Keturah makes a deal with death that if she can find true love before he comes for her like in her stories, he will let her live. The story progresses with Keturah extending how long she gets to live by continuing her story for Lord Death and refusing to give him the ending of the story until the next night.

While this is going on, she is trying to find someone that she truly loves and is slowly realizing that she loves Lord Death, and not only that, but that he loves her as well. The prince of the land (I can't recall his name.) is also in love with Keturah and when she finally tries to go to Lord Death willingly, the prince tries to stop her and get her to marry him but she refuses and leaves the world of the living to marry Lord Death, and in a sense, live forever.

The book Shattered Mirror is a vampire and a vampire hunter book. Not particularly shocking if you know me. But anyway, this book is about a vampire hunter out to kill the most powerful vampire. She moves into a new town with her family and discovers that she is going to school with vampires but they aren't dangerous and she is ordered not to attack them. However, one of them is the younger (I think) brother of the vampire that the hunter is looking for. Not only that, she has unintentionally made friends with the two vampires at her school.

When she finally finds the one she is looking for, she freezes up because he looks like her friend which would have been fatal if he had chosen to kill her but instead he only chose to mark her. The biggest problem as the book develops, the younger brother has fallen in love with the hunter so when his older brother wants to kill her, they decide to blood bond her to both of them instead. The only problem with that is that her witch blood tries to destroy the vampire blood that is fusing with her own which is killing her. The only solution is to turn her into a vampire and then allow her to choose to die of her own free will or live as an immortal being and hunted by her own family.

Both of these books are good books. I would recommend the first one to those who are looking for a good romance and the other who has a love for complicated friendships and vampires. In either case, both books are extremely good.

...I Guess I Can Put This here....

Write a reflective piece about how the method of presentation aided the sharing of information. What would happen to this information without this type of visual design? What does it suggest about how humans take in information? What is the implication for the content that is created by you and everyone around you on the web?

Um, alright. I'm not really sure what we were supposed to be talking about with this but I'm guessing it had to do with the video we watched. And with that in mind, I thought the visual design used to present what was being talked about was good for this presentation. The graphs demonstrating the changes over time were incredibly effective and were likely to be the best way to get the point across. Without the visuals, I think that the effect that the presentation would have been far less than it was. I would say that it was just because I am a visual learner but in this case, I don't think that was the only reason. Without seeing the change over time, I don't think that the same impression would have been left if it had just been explained and the actual movement displayed by the visuals weren't there.

I think that humans in general are very visual learners. Visual things keep our attention better than anything else which is why information that is trying to be passed is usually visual. That is why when we use the internet, in order to attract people to what we want other people to see, we make things look very visually appealing. It depends on what the site is about what they use to keep the user interested. Some just use similar colors and know that users are going to be interested because of what the site is for (http://www.stepheniemeyer.com/) while others use pictures and other things to keep the reader interested (http://www.thesoulfest.com/2009/sf/home.html)

TWILIGHT (The book and the movie) NOT a fan girl opinion

Yeah yeah yeah, I'll bet seeing this your thinking "fan girl" and those of you that aren't, well, good for you. After all, this isn't going to be a blog about how fantastic Twilight was. I will, however, get out of the way that I thought that Twilight was a good book. That doesn't mean that I thought it was the best thing in the world. I don't. It was written to simply to be a fantastic piece of work, but it clearly expresses emotions...even if it is done in a stalker sort of way. I liked it because it expresses the kind of love that I want to feel someday. An undying love.

However, I am going to say that the movie was terrible. 120% terrible. They took so much away from the book in the movie and I would understood that if they hadn't changed it as well. They took out what felt like, not only to me, but many people, important pieces of the book were missing in the movie. I was hoping that the movie would be as breath taking as some people had promised it to be but when it came out and I went to see it, I found myself utterly disappointed with it. Some of it was disappointment with the final cast selection, and some of it was, as mentioned earlier, disappointment with what they took away and changed.

Anyway, enough ranting about how bad the movie was and how much better the book was. I'm done :)

Something More I've read. Seriously, you should consider this too.

Okay, so I'm pretty sure I said I would be updating regularly on books I've read so here we go. The latest book I've completed was The Thirteen Reasons Why. This is most definitely another book I would suggest to people who want something that it a good read. I'm not saying that it has a happy ending. It doesn't. In fact, it's about a girl who committed suicide and the tapes she left behind explaining why. And guess what's on those seven tapes. Thirteen different reasons that Hannah Baker committed suicide. And these seven tapes are being sent to each person who has affected her life drastically enough to push her to the extreme. And if they don't, well, those tapes will be made public. And you can guess, Clay, the person who has received the tapes, is somehow involved. And the only way he is going to find out how is by listening to the tapes of Hannah's life to find out how he helped push her to the extreme. Or did he? That question can only be answered by reading the books and finding out.

Now, I'm sure some people are wondering, 'why on earth would I read a book about a suicidal girl?' Here is an answer. The ending is not actually 'sad'; well, not in my opinion. After all, in order to have a well written book, the character has to go through a change. And yes, I'm sure that hearing the life story of Hannah Baker (as far as I know, she is not real. But she might be) would be life changing for the people who actually hear about it. But That is not completely the change I'm referencing here. Clay also went through another change. It is subtly slipped into the book about another girl who has many of the "tell tale signs" of someone who is suicidal. Or at the very least, the signs mentioned in the book. The reader would only notice at the end when the author brings her up again.

Anyway, with this knowledge, Clay, at the end of the book after having finished the tapes and mailed them on to the next person, sees her in the hall. And he goes after her. That is the end of the story but honestly, I would like to see where it would have gone. The way the author ended the book was capable of opening up a sequel to the book. I don't know if there is so I will be looking for one and updating on that later.

I would advise this book to anyone who desires something that is well written and in depth on common problems with high schools today. Like rumors and lies. Those are most definitely covered in this book. Among many other things. For people who enjoy reading things like that, have at The Thirteen Reasons Why and for those who don't, well then, I suggest something else. Perhaps something else that I've already suggested or will likely suggest in the future.

I've been reading these, why don't you???

Alright, I'm not really sure what I should put here since I'm not one for giving my opinions over the internet. But since I have to, I guess I'll start with books. I love books and am an avid reader and writer and have a massive list of books that I could suggest to you. So I'm going to use this to suggest books and then mention what I think of them.

So, some books I would suggest as individual books would be Blood and Chocolate, Poison, Ink Exchange, The Hero and The Crown, and The Blue Sword. Each of these books were fabulous because of their uniqueness and were books that I was actually able to feel like the author was talking to the reader through the characters in the book unlike some books and it addresses a common thing that people in general should address; the journey to find oneself.

Blood and Chocolate is a wonderfully written book about a werewolf girl (Vivian) who has just lost her father and leader only a year before and is now dealing with her own teenage hormones and her mother's "rebound" from the grief of the loss of her husband. In a new town, things start to get weird as Vivian is falling in love with a human boy and mysterious murders are appearing all over town. This book is full of romance and mystery and in underlying tones, expresses the journey that Vivian takes to discovering who and what she is truly meant to be.

Poison is, in a sense, along the same lines in terms of the main character finding who and what she is meant to be. This book takes place in a more fantasy based world, where there are things like faeries that exist. At the loss of her sister, Poison (the main character) sets off to find and save her sister who has been taken by the Faeries. After many journeys and after meeting many new people, Poison solves the mystery that has taken place here as well and in the process learned and accepted who she is and what her destiny is meant to be.

Ink Exchange is about a teenage girl, Leslie who has spent most of her life being abused by her family. She is determined to get a tattoo that expresses her desire for freedom and her need to have her body back as her own. This book too is a fantasy book in that it contains faeries from multiple courts (the summer, winter and dark court) and it is about how Leslie becomes intermingled in this world with love and lust until she no longer wants anything to do with it. In this book, Leslie has already determined who she is and what she wants from her life when the book starts but it is about how she goes from gaining the independence she wanted, to losing that and then regaining it again.

The Hero and the Crown and The Blue Sword are both books written by the same author and are both about girls who have destinies that, when the book starts out, they have no idea. They take place in the same place, although in different times but the theme is similar. There is a great evil that is threatening the land, and the heroine must rise to her destiny and save the people. In both cases, they have to visit the same places to get their journey started, but the defeat of the villain, although in different places, is both similar in how some giant rocky structure ends up crushing him due to a magic sword. Afterward, the heroine marries the prince and rules with him happily ever after. A fairy tale of sorts, yes, but once again, it carries with the theme of the books in this blog which happens to be finding oneself or ones destiny.

These are not the only books I have read that carry this particular theme, but these are the ones that stick out the most to me because I thought they were nicely written and easy to understand without intense amounts of thinking. And not only that, but it doesn't feel like there is a similar theme here in comparison with other, older books or movies. Anyway, these are some good books I would recommend and I will probably post another blog later, reviewing other books that I liked and think should get some credit. If any of these sound interesting, I would definitely suggest you read these. You won't regret it.

Music and Music Groups

Alright, I still have no idea what I really want to write about but oh well. I guess it will be whatever comes to mind. I could probably write about books or music...or writing. But I really really don't want to blog about writing. At least, not right now. So...I think I'm going to write more about music I like and the music groups that go along with that.

First of all, I'm sure anyone who's read my last blog knows I like religious music. And I'll bet you can also figure out which groups I like here too. Like Skillet and Flyleaf. But these aren't the only groups that I like. I also like listening to singers like Bob Rice and Ben Walther who actually have some really good songs. I've also started listening to Third Day, although whether I mentioned that or not I'm not sure.

I'm not particularly picky about the music that I listen to in terms of genre as long as its not rap. There is one exception to that but I'm not going into that right now. But anyway, other preferred groups would be Something Corporate, Boys Like Girls, Red Jumpsuit Apparatus Within Temptation, Nightwish and multiple other groups. I like Something Corporate, the Red Jumpsuit Apparatus, and Boys Like Girls because they are the groups that help me express the most how I feel a lot of the time while groups like Within Temptation and Nightwish express things that I wish I could do or be or wish would happen.

There are other groups that I'm interested in listening to as well that fall under the country genre and those are people like Keith Urban, Shaina Twain, and Terri Clark. Each artist writes music that can either make me laugh or cry or make me mad or happy, depending on what I am feeling or what I really want to feel like at the time.

These qualities, in my opinion, are things that music should be able to express in order for it to be good. If they don't meet any of these qualities, than the music would seem rather pointless. However, I am NOT saying that I think that music that doesn't express these things to me is pointless. It may very well accomplish that for someone, including the artist who may be writing just to get feelings out, even if it seems pointless.

SoulFest

SoulFest is a collection of Catholic and/or Christian (I'm not sure if its one or both) music artists. It takes place over four days and gains a lot of publicity among both Catholic and Christian religions. Through out the whole day there are four different concerts going at the same time on different sections of Gunstock Mountain.

Even though the tickets are expensive unless in a group, the experience is worth it. I went last year for my birthday and had a blast. I got to see two of my favorite bands, Skillet and Flyleaf, and got to find even more bands that sounded interesting. New groups that I found at SoulFest were Barlow Girl and Third Day. These are both awesome groups in my opinion, although others may, and probably will, disagree with me.

Anyway, SoulFest isn't all about the music. It actually is more than just a giant four day concert. During the day, there are programs that go on between the concerts. Some of them are raffles. A big raffle that happens toward the end is the raffling of a guitar signed by all the artists that were there during the four days. Other things that go on between can be inspirational talks from the host of the stage or the host will talk about what they are trying to put a stop to. This years happens to be abolition; last years target was abortion.

All in all, SoulFest is a worth while experience for anyone that goes. There is never a dull moment and everyone enjoys it (from what I saw last year) and I also know people that keep coming back so it must mean that at least THEY enjoy it. Anyway, even if you aren't Catholic or Christian and you love music, this would be the place to go. Just make sure you have a deep enough wallet. :)