The Anchorage Youth Symphony will be representing the United States in an upcoming event in Sydney Australia next year. I am lucky enough to be a part of this symphony. Also, I am even more lucky to have my boyfriend sit next to me the whole way (hopefully).
Best Buy in Anchorage 11 July 2008
I have been working at a comic book store. Recently, I have realized that I deserve a better job. What is slightly better than Bosco’s Comics and Games? Best Buy, home of electronics. My application has been looked over by three different people exclusively, and I’ve been interviewed as much. They like me and I am going in for a drug test on Monday and orientation on Saturday.
The media section is where I am going to work, for now. Later in the year, though, a new music department is going to be built. Where the appliances are sound proof rooms will be built. Lessons will be taught for a variety of instruments, which will be available. There will be many string instruments, drums, and keyboards to start off. Also, there will be a room in which you can record the music you play. Once this is built, I will work there and give bass lessons (bassism coming soon).
music 30 June 2008
My boyfriend left for Michigan last Tuesday. Since then I’ve been left with myself to do whatever I please with no interference. Naturally, I did what I did last summer, I went to the mall. My visits to the mall have been different, though. I actually experienced the wonderful aspect of it instead of the one in which boredom is the only feeling felt. I wasn’t bored. In fact, I discovered what priorities I actually have in life. Music.
The people I decided to hang out with were musicians. Their favorite genre to play is metal. So, as most metal musicians do, they decided to smoke some weed. It was open mike night at the teen club in the mall and they planned on playing, but got high first. We all hear about the jazz players in the past getting high for inspiration. What I’ve never though about before, which I can’t believe I haven’t, is why they did.
I used to be a huge fan of smoking weed myself, but it was to experience paranoia (which won’t leave, but that’s a different story. I quit for health and moral reasons, but that’s not the point. The point is the musicians getting high.
When a person is stoned, it is easier to focus on one thing for a prolonged period of time. For my musician friends the answer is obvious why they did it. But to get into it further, they were better at creating music because of this. They are human with emotions and experiences like everyone else. Memory has helped them compile these feelings and experiences into a completely new, entertaining experience for everyone.
For the musician they get to tell their story, or any story for that matter. For the audience, they get to listen to art, another person’s soul. Music is so much deeper than a lot of people appreciate. Do not get me wrong. I say a lot, meaning there are a lot of people who don’t appreciate music to its fullest. Hell, I don’t think anyone appreciates music to its fullest because we aren’t capable of it. We can appreciate most of music. Everything we care about. Whether it be about the story being told, the beat of the song, the killer guitar solos, or the waves of sound and the ratios that the chords hit perfectly.
Anyway, so we were hanging out outside of the mall because it closed and we were kicked out. What we did, though, was have fun. Genuine fun. All of us were happy. It took nothing but a few guitars and creativity. No money was involved (then again, we did make money while singing) to have this kind of fun. We sang, played games, chatted, talked about life, talked about the sky, everything. Then, them being stoners, they left me to walk the 2 miles home by myself. That experience was wholesome, though, and I would trade it for nothing. Not even my boyfriend coming home sooner.
The experience goes on. There were guitars in our circle and two people were constantly playing the guitars. Music helped make the fun happen. We were of all different social groups. The guitarists were goth/metalheads, another was a girly artist, one was a metrosexual raver (what raver isn’t metrosexual, though?) and I, myself, am a nerd. Music brought us all together peacefully. Is it so much to ask for the world to stop and listen just for a moment? Three seconds. It needn’t even be to music that they listen. But if they heard the noises made by the world then we could become more united.
We all are related. If you are Christian then you believe that we are descended from Adam and Eve. If you believe in evolution, then you believe we are descended from a few thousand people from Africa millions of years ago. No matter what you believe, it seems, the truth of it is we are a part of the same family. We are Human! We have something wonderful no other creature on earth has (spare a few, like the whales) we have music. Complex music, simple music, abstract music, ’square’ music. We have different genres, different styles, different tastes, different backgrounds, but ultimately the same one.
Everything I said I hold close to me. It has probably all been said before, but when a person has a revelation, an actual revelation, one cannot be expected to hold in their excitement. Recognizing something that is really important that was once just taken advantage of, the truth becomes clear. Music helps a lot of people. It is important to everyone on some level. One day I will put my music here. Until then, farewell.
My First GMing Experience Coming Soon! 23 June 2008
I have discovered a new RPG called Squirrel Attack!: Operation: Get Mr. Jones’ Nuts. My group and I are going to play as squirrels. Squirrels! How often is it that you have the opportunity to play a silly game like that? All the time I suppose, but this going to be my first experience with a game that is not serious and as a GM.
A Short History of the Atom 9 June 2008
Thanks to a few scientists who dedicated their time to discover facts about the atom, we now know that they look kind of insane and are more than just an orb, but contain more particles than many think. The first person to mention the existence of such particles was Democritus who lived circa 400 BCE. Though he mention atoms, he had no experimental evidence and was more of a philosophical scientist rather than a proof scientist.
Roger Bacon created the basis that science should be backed up with experimental evidence in the thirteenth century.
The Law of Conservation of Mass was proposed by Antoine Lavoisier in 1774 which stated that in chemical reactions mass in neither created nor destroyed.
Joseph Proust established the Law of Constant Composition. This law states that each pure chemical compound always has the same percentage composition of each element by mass.
The Atomic Theory was put into terms by John Dalton in 1803-1808 which listed a few things:
- All matter is composed of tiny, indivisible particles, called atoms, that cannot be destroyed or created.
- Each element has atoms that are identical to each other in all of their properties, and these properties are different from all other elements.
- Chemical reactions are simple rearrangements of atoms from one combination to another in small whole number ratios.
Also the Law of Multiple Proportions was established by Dalton. He said when two elements can be combined to make two different compounds, and if the samples of these two compounds was taken so that the masses of one of the elements in the two compounds are the same in both samples, then the ratio of the masses of the other element in these compounds will be a ratio of small whole numbers.
Michael Faraday proved that electric current could cause chemical reactions to occur. Big whoop. I mean, MOVING ON!
Sir William Crookes developed the cathode ray. With the aide of this silly looking device, a glow was noticed between two electrodes when a high voltage was applied to them. The stream of what we discovered were electrons could be deflected by a magnet and the stream could be changed if an object was placed in the path.
J.J. Thomson discovered electron with the cathode ray. The mass to charge ratio was established by Thomson as well. It is m/e = -1.76 * 108 coulombs/gram-1 . He discovered, too, that the mass of a single electron is 1.76 * 10-28 gram.
Robert Millikan did his oil drop experiment and found the charge of a single electron to be -1.60 * 10-19 coulomb.
The alpha and beta particles were found by Ernest Rutherford. With Hans Geiger and Ernest Marsden, he performed the gold foil experiment and appointed the nuclear model of the atom which was explained as a small, dense, and positively charged nucleus surrounded by empty space sparsely occupied by electrons. Rutherford also found the proton, which is the particle that has a positive charge. He found it to have a mass of 1.67 * 10-24 gram which is 1,836 times heavier than the electron.
The neutron was discovered by an English Physicist named James Chadwick. It has almost the same mass of a proton and has no charge and therefore is neutral.
Niels Bohr created the shell model of the atom. He assumed that electrons orbit the nucleus in certain set orbits. Max Planck helped Bohr’s model out by describing light as packets, or quanta of energy called photons.
Louis de Broglie (de bròj lee ay) believed that electrons could display some wave-like properties if light can be considered as particles.
The wave-mechanical theory - determined that the electron in the model is described by a probability of where it will be located - was established by Erwin Schrödinger.
The uncertainty principle was developed by Werner Heisenberg in the 1920s. It states that the position and the velocity of a particle cannot be known at the same time. As one becomes more known, the other becomes less certain.
That will be all I have for the atom for the present. More data will be added soon when I study more of it.
D&D and Magic 8 June 2008
Currently I am waiting to go back to school to govern the role playing club at school. I was elected president at the last meeting the seniors were allowed to attend. Of course, I do not believe I deserved to be the president, but I am the one of the only girls in the club so I suppose that helped… a lot.
Upon waiting for the summer to end a new version will be sold on June 6, 2008. The thing is, I work at Bosco’s and am aware that our store has had the books in the back for a week. Day after laborious day I march back and forth past the glorious new books in anticipation for the midnight of the morrow when I am finally granted permission to rip open the shrink wrap and make a character for my own, to learn the new ways, the new monsters, the improvements (if you want to call them that) on the classes and races, monsters and worlds. Soon. To be put through that kind of torture is intolerable and a price must be paid. Mainly, I wish to never have to deal with Magic cards unless they were my own after tomorrow.
For the past few days that I have been working my boss has put me to work on pricing magic cards. Mind, I have thousands to do. A rough estimate would be about 2500. But enough about that.
Sulfur is Evil! 8 June 2008
Sulfur is an evil element, let me tell you why. when an anion contains oxygen, the prefix hydro- is added to the root of the anion or element and then the suffix -ic is added. So for H2S, the name would be hydrosulfuric acid. When an anion does not contain oxygen, the end of the word is what counts. HSO4 or HSO3 would be sulfuric acid and sulfurous acid. When the name of the anion ends in -ate you add -ic to the root of the anion then acid. If the name of the anion ends in -ite,-ous is added to the root of the anion. This rule is hard for me to remember, especially when Sulfur has to be a little bitch and do whatever it pleases without thinking of others.
Frutista Freeze 4 June 2008
For the past week or so my boyfriend has been talking a lot about the Frutista Freeze drinks that Taco Bell is serving for a short time. I thought nothing of it, but now that I have actually tried one, they are incredible! There are so many reasons these drinks are good. First of all, there is soda water in the smoothie. That adds a twist to each sip that is to kill for. Then they just taste great! There may be only two flavors, but the REAL strawberries that are poured on top are excellent. So my advice to you is to go to the nearest Taco Bell and try one of these great drinks. They are truly worth what little money they are running for.
