November 28

Yesterday the power went out and my toes were cold. I woke up to my parents laughing in the bedroom next door. My brother and I were going to wake up at 8 and then go for a run, but that didn't happen. I got up and went to my parents room where I jumped in between them and pulled the covers over me. We laughed and talked, those bonding moments are really great. It was 9:30 and we were all still in bed, which is surprising, because my parents are always out of bed at 8 and making breakfast or doing something. My parents are thinking of buying this house in town to then renovate it and sell it, if they don't buy it some other guy is thinking of demolishing it and putting some trailer. We got out of bed and ate breakfast quickly, because we had an appointment at 10:30 to see the house and a guy was going to inspect it for termites. This house looks like it came right out of some scary movie, it's falling apart and there is garbage everywhere. We went inside and the smell was so disgusting, there is mold everywhere, crackers, dirty dishes, old cameras, clothes, books laying around, etc. There are no termites in the house, but there is so much work to be done. After we looked at the house we went home and the twins came over. The twins are like my little sisters who I have known for nine years or so, how we met is another story. So they came over and played chinese checkers while watching Gataca. I won! After we watched the movie we ate Thanksgiving left overs and then played some frisbee outside. While we were all outside we somehow started to invent our own sign language. Toes are cold. Nice. and sunrise, and sunset is as far as we got. It was really funny. We went inside and made some tea and tried to read our future. The tea leaves at the bottom of the cup could mean anything. Soon after they left, my brother and I started playing the piano. It was exhilarating! We went crazy, really feeling the music, being the music. It was beautiful. I had been feeling pretty sad these past few days and I wasn't sure why. I guess just analyzing myself too much and over thinking things. But then my brother and I talked about it, cried together, and then laughed. We drew afterwards and reminisced on childhood memories. Well After that I just felt so happy! And i feel great now. I'm not so angry anymore, I'm relaxed and going with the flow with a positive attitude. I guess at times when you feel that nothing is good you have to wait a bit and see that things really are beautiful.

There you go suzie! love you

Saturday

On saturday I baked scones, meditated, drank tea, and listened to music. Helped out a friend, attempted to go to an art show, made dinner with two great women and watched fight club. Awesome!

Reality

http://www.poodwaddle.com/clocks2.htm

Thank you Susanita! I love this picture

Nicaragua

Thank you Dalia for showing me this.
Amazing video. The begining of the video which starts off at a garbage dump is what the garbage dump in Managua, Nicaragua looked like. People live off of what they find there, scraps of medal being the most valuable. Seeing the garbage dump was one of the most impactful experiences of my life, so far. The people that live next to the garbage dump are exposed to all kinds of diseases. This is there life and they have no way out. There are though great efforts in Nicaragua to become sustainable and create fair trade within the country and the world. Giving the opportunity for women, men and children to escape this poverty. At the begining of our trip we stayed in a coffee cooperative near Matagalpa where the people there were considered poor, but it was a completely different kind of poverty compared to what we saw in Managua. In the cooperative all the farmers work together, have enough food, and their children have access to a school. I think that they have everything neccesary to live. They do not have "luxuries" like flat screen t.vs, or whatever else is in that catagory. They were happy, relaxed, kind, and peaceful.
They have time to be with their families and relax after a long day at work, while here in the city most of us are always worried about work and don't stop running around, I think it's good to get away once in a while. Runaway for the weekend.

Bike Ride

I had the best day today!
Biked to school with Ari along the river, had fresh air instead of being in a dirty train. I was awake all day except for in science when we were watching No Reservations I fell asleep for a bit. Lunch was awesome, went to Fordham and played hacky sack.
My bike ride back home healed me! I had been feeling kind of down, mostly from school, but after this bike ride, I'm myself again. Instead of being home in 20 minutes it took me an hour. I chilled with Augie and Jack for a bit on the corner and then I biked along riverside. As I was biking close to the tennis courts I saw a man sitting down, his face was lifted towards the sun and his eyes closed, so I turned around and the sun was beaming. I got off my bike and sat on a bench where I did the same as the man a few benches over and took a nap. I dreamed a little, but I don't remember what it was about. After 15 minutes I opened my eyes and everything looked blue, I guess from too much sun in my eyes. I finally got on to the Cherry Walk where I biked until I saw a man doing Tai Chi. He was a beautiful little asian man, standing on a rock that went out towards the Hudson River, facing NJ and the sun. I took this time to meditate which I had not done in months. When I opened my eyes the Tai Chi man was walking down the Cherry Road away from me, so I left too. I called my brother before I got on my bike to tell him how happy I was, but he was talking with a teacher so he said he would call me back, but he didn't. I rode my bike a little further unitl I noticed these rock sculptures and drift wood sculptures, I stopped to check those out and to make a sculpture myself. It's cool to have something I have made there, now when I bike I'll be looking out for it. That was my last stop till I reached my building. The wind was pushing against me, I felt like a big old man. Everyone that was riding downtown was flying past me. But I'm happy that I was going slow, because I paid attention to things that I may have missed if I was going any faster.

The Cat Empire

I wasn't able to post this video but check it out here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v-VOB8ajbzY&feature=fvw
This morning I woke up singing this song.


I went to one of their concerts some years ago without knowing who they were which was awsome, because I didn't know what to expect. My brother hadn't really heard of them either but his friends were going so he got us tickets. It was an amazing concert.
Tomorrow is going to be a beautiful day! I'm going to bike to school with Ari, along the river and enjoy the last days of fall.

According to my biorhythms tomorrow my intellectual and physical is high and my emotional is low.

Got my mind set on you

Fordham and Leaves

Today my friends and I went to Fordham for lunch and to play hacky sack. A lot of kids came, everyone was playing ultimate, socializing, playing hacky sack or just enjoying the beautiful day. Most of man kinds creations are so useless and ludicrous! For example the leaf blower. People blow their leaves away in order to see their "beautiful" green lawns. After people are done blowing their leaves into a pile they are put into black garbage bags which are then picked up by a garbage truck and brought to a landfill or some dumpster. There, the leaves probably rot and release c02 emissions contributing to global warming. This is a brainless invention, a waste of gas and time.
On our way to the field these two men were blowing leaves and I mentioned to my friends the frustration that I felt towards this invention. This machine uses gas to blow leaves into a pile in order to remove the NATURAL leaves from the grass. I was curious to see who invented this machine and what it is so:

"A leaf blower is a gardening tool that propels air out of a nozzle to move yard debris such as leaves. Leaf blowers are usually powered by two-stroke engine or an electric motor, but four-stroke engines were recently introduced to partially address air pollution concerns. Leaf blowers are typically self contained handheld units, or backpack mounted units with a handheld wand. The latter is more ergonomic for prolonged use.

Some units can also suck in leaves and small twigs via a vacuum, and shred them into a bag. In that role it is called a blower vac."

"The leaf blower was invented by Dom Quinto in the late 1950s[citation needed]. It was originally introduced to the United States as part of an agricultural chemical sprayer. Shortly thereafter manufacturers discovered that many consumers were removing the chemical dispensing parts from the device, leaving only the blower behind. Manufacturers then saw the potential of their invention as a common lawn and garden maintenance tool. Drought conditions in California facilitated acceptance of the leaf blower as the use of water for many garden clean-up tasks was prohibited. By 1990, annual sales were over 800,000 in the U.S., and the tool had become a ubiquitous gardening implement."

Not only is the concept of the leaf blower ridiculous it is also a source of air and noise pollution. Many cities have started to ban leaf blowers.
NYC should be next. Who ever has a leaf blower, YOU SUCK!

Turtle Vibes

Im trying to think when I had my first encounter with a turtle,I think it was preschool. We went to the zoo or a pet shop and this man was showing us a turtle and he let us touch it. They are so cool! About seven summers ago at a camp we made a totem pole and we had to think of something we wanted to carve and I carved a turtle, but I don't know what influenced me to do that. From what I have seen of turtles they seem to be very peaceful and wise animals. Turtles symbolize mother earth and "our ability to find happiness on mother earth." Yes turtles are slow, but there is nothing wrong with that. Many of us tend to think that fast and quick is better, but why? At least in my life everything is too quick and I need to take the time to go slow. The fact that turtles symbolize mother earth and our ability to be happy on it says that we should be living life slow and not running all over the place always trying to get stuff done. Maybe if we took more time in doing the things we loved we would be happier or if we walked a little slower.

Surrounding yourself with negative vibes is not the way to go. Always be positive and strive for happiness.

This is my first blog post and im pysched to start updating everyday. My inspiration for starting this blog was my friend Ari who has the coolest blog I've seen.

Adding on to what I wrote before about always being positive and striving for happiness. My brother said to me what do you mean? Don't preach. I felt insulted at first, because I was just expressing my idea of a way to be. He then said well what does this happiness and postivity look like?
For everyone happiness is different and positivity as well, I guess. So to me striving for happiness and being positive means to find things that warm your heart, make you smile, make you want to do something, inspiration, and loving others and yourself. A sunset makes me happy, flowers, trees and everything natural, music, ari's blog, a warm day, a cold day, biking, hiking, talking to people on the street or on the train, a smile, playing ultimate frisbee, and so much more. For everyone this is different, but whatever it is for each one of us it relates in the feeling. Maybe if everyday we thought of what made us happy or did something that we love then we would be happier and excited each day of our life. My overall thought is that I want a stronger community with kind loving people.