Coffee=Bad Handwriting—-> Computer/Coffee industry conspiracy.

 

So I spent several hours of my day imbibing lots of coffee/doing homework. I realized that the amount of coffee I consumed had a direct relationship with how shitty my handwriting became. By the time i finished my fourth cup- I could barely write.  This made me wonder if the advent of the typewriter and more recently the computer had some connection with the coffee industry.

I think it is far from sensational to say that there may have been collusion between the coffee industry and the industry behind the typewriter and computer. When a person drinks more coffee, they are likely to not use a pencil/pen as often- simply because it isn’t possible. However, as I am now proving- it is fairly simple to type (I feel as if my ability to type is perhaps even enhanced). 

This just shows the flexibility of the coffee industry, and, not to mention the intelligence of the people who facilitate its development. Interesting huh? So, next time you buy a computer,you may want to consider how much more coffee you may end up drinking, and how much of and impact that may have on your wallet. It may not be a conspiracy, it just may be a fact.

JR

SO, I’ve been obsessed with this guys art work. I often check Wooster Collective to keep up on my knowledge of street art- me trying to be hip.

So basically he takes pictures of people making goofy faces and blows them up and then puts them on buildings/surfaces that are in some location that makes a sort of statement.  The picture above is most recent, a project done in Kibera Kenya, apparently it can be seen from google earth. He also did a project in the middle east showing faces of Israeli’s and Palestinians making goofy faces next to each other. Check it out, JR’s Website.

To Uganda!

I’ve decided that I’m going to go to Uganda for two months this summer.

I’m part in a student org at Loyola called Invisible Conflicts. The group sparked after a few students watched the movie “Invisible Children” that tells the story the hundreds of children that used to make a night commute to avoid being captured by rebels and then being turned into child soldiers.

When the group started up a few years ago, a connection with Uganda was forged. After a while the connection developed into a full on relationship including the creation of Dwan Madiki, an after school center in Lachor, Uganda, near Gulu. If you’ve ever seen the movie “Invisible Children“, the children commute to Lachor hospital, which apparently is right across the street from the new Dwan Madiki office. 

Part of the relationship we have with Dwan Madiki is sponsoring 20 students, that have been affected by the Ugandan civil war, by paying their tuition with money we fund raise during the school year. One fund raising event we do is the- IC Plunge- jumping into lake michigan in December- which  is an incredible experience and if you are a Loyola student (or just anyone in the area) I HIGHLY suggest you do it next year! 

In just the past few weeks all of the students we sponsor have been accepted to premier schools in their region. Its really exciting to see so many students/community members/family members participating in something that affects these 20 children in such a positive way. 

The past two summers and last years Christmas groups of students from Loyola have went to Dwan Madiki to work on developing the program. This facet of IC helps continually foster the relationship that Invisible Conflicts- in Chicago- has with this center in Uganda. This year, its my turn- It looks like I’ll be going from the end of May until the end of July. I’m excited, and a little nervous but I forsee this trip as being a very important point in my life. The work done across borders in this situation completely blows my mind. There is no reason to give up hope on other countries, or stop believing that you can make a difference around the world. Dwan Madiki/Invisible Conflicts is pure proof! If you want to know more check out the Invisible Conflicts website, or ask me!

Also, if you have any international travel advice let me know! This is a first for me (aside from getting ice cream in Canada a few times)

Ethiopian Food?

Me and K-side  went to Ethiopian Diamond for dinner tonight. I’ve been once before with my dad- and it was great. Anyways, I really wanted to get the word out on Ethiopian food. QUE RICO! I love it.

The presentation at Ethiopian Diamond is very cool. We sat at the traditional round table on chairs made of wood and some kind of animal hide…cow perhaps/likely.  The food you order is placed on injera, a foamy sourdough bread (see above). Tonight we had lentils, potatoes, collard greens, chicken, and chick peas. To eat you don’t use silverware, just he injera and your hands. Keeping it simple, you wrap up what you want to eat in injera and consume! Its fantastic.

Also, the environment at Ethiopian Diamond is very cool. two rows of tables are set up in long columns in the front and the restaurant is completely open. If you like your privacy, you might have a hard time- no booths. but that’s one of the best parts if you ask me. you feel like you are sharing the meal with everyone, not just the people you are eating with. 

In honor of the inauguration they had tv’s on showing the ball, recordings of the speech (and the ” I have a Dream” speech), and later in the night they were going to have some different speakers talk about the day’s happenings. Wish we could have stayed around but, alas, the difficulties of college life caught up with us and we had to do homework.

If you live in the Roger’s Park area or are ever visiting- check out the Ethiopian Diamond, you won’t regret it! http://www.ethiopiandiamondcuisine.com/

OBAMA! – a few quick words on the inauguration

I just watched the Inauguration of the 44th president of the United States. I was wowed by every part of the  ceremony.  Though I’m not a big Rick Warren fan his speech was very respectful. It may have carried a little more Christian influence than I thought was fair to some people that represent this country- but I truly was glad to hear what he had to say. Then you have Aretha Franklin. What a woman. She sent some major chills down my spine (As does Kelsey when she sings patriotic songs…). Also, I had no idea about this little piece by John Williams, it was beautiful. 

Obama’s address was very impressive- which, of course, is nothing new. He didn’t look down once. I’m glad to have an engaging president whom I can be excited to hear speak.

My favorite line from the speech was “We will extend the hand if you are willing to unclench the fist”. I’m very excited to see his method in action. 

I’ve got that crazy happy feeling that makes me all warm inside… you know? I’m very excited for this country.

P.S. I’m also sinistral…

Spinning

 

Kelsey's Mother Marian spindle

So, for Christmas I made Kelsey a Mother Marian spindle. A type of spinning wheel. She knits like crazy so I thought it would be cool if she could get in on the process a step earlier and spin her own wool.

 

I built the spinning wheel based off a YouTube video I found. I couldn’t find plans for the machine so I just used the size of the woman’s hands in the video to set up ratios that allowed me to build the spindle properly.  Most of these spindles have a solid base to hold it down. I thought that the extra weight was unneccesary so I wrote up a blueprint to make it hollow, figuring that it could hold spun wool/raw wool that wasn’t being used immediately. This actually turned out alright which was nice…

Unfortunately I didn’t have enough left over wood in my garage to make it so I went out and bought a 1x8x5 piece of red oak and cut it into several different pieces.

The saw blade I used was a little dull which ended up burning the wood at times. Luckily I had a radial sander on hand… though some of the burns ran deep- the sander was able to clean most of them up. and oh my let me just say, there is something special about a freshly cut and sanded piece of wood.  I’ve never really worked with oak before. When its all cleaned up it is really something else.

After getting it all smoothed out I had to figure out how to assemble it. This was definately the most difficult part. I didn’t have a work shop at home so I set one up on the ping pong table in my Dad’s basement (which my brothers were not to keen on). I had to use an awkward arrangement of clamps and scrap wood to get the parts of the spindle in place before I drilled holes and connected them. Most of this part was luck. no shit.

In the end it turned out pretty well- and all it required was: 1”x8”x5′ piece of wood. a 1/2” dowel, a 1 1/4” hinge,a small hook and a some sort of solid round mass to use as the kicker.

I’m hoping Kelsey will send me a picture of it so I can post it along with this…

We’ve already spun 2 skeins of yarn from it and she knit me a hat from the yarn. You can check out the hat at kelzuki.wordpress.com

Problems!

So, I’ve encountered a few problems with my blog already.

I’m having problems changing the image on my header, which I previosly had no problem updating. And I cannot access my dashboard or post new entries when I’m using Google Chrome. Anyone else experience this?

Here Goes Nothing!

So, my roomate started blogging and has had some very interesting results. Inspired, I am following in his… keystrokes.

Anyways! There is no particular topic for this blog but there will be certain areas I will likely concentrate my posts on: things like… Economics, Sustainability, Building things, Biking. 

SO COGNITIVE!

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