myfoodfridge.com

Rejoice all you motherless, ochlophobic, fast food savoring pseudo-adults. In what may feel like ages, your fridge may once again be a friend to your nutritionally starved stomach.

Picture the scene: it's a typical weeknight after you've returned from a long day at work. A flurry of activity and guilty pleasures buffered your mind from the need to go out and shop for food. Upon inspecting your refrigerator, you see very little in the way of a complete meal. Incongruous somethings are scattered about. There are three options:

1) Make something out of what you already have.
2) Go out to the store and buy the missing items that will satiate you.
3) Say, "Screw it!," and go out to eat, be it fast food or a sit-down restaurant.

Typically, option three is the one we default to because it's easiest. However, this option does take a toll on our finances if it is abused on a habitual basis.

I recently came across a fabulous website called my fridge food, which gives you the power to take charge of your refrigerator, making it work for you. Make an account and fill your virtual shelves with the items you typically purchase; or choose from the items found in the "Quick Kitchen" tab and discover meals you never would have imagined. Ramen + Jello is an actual dessert, did you know?  And before you bash it, remember that both bread and rice puddings exist. Additionally, this website functions off community advice, so if you have a recipe that is delicious—make a post.

The internet exists to make our lives easier, and this website is a prime example of the sort of control we can have over our impulsive behaviors. Let's create an example, why don't we?

Typical bachelor who works 9-5; comes from a home where Friday nights were designated takeout nights; lives in an area filled with an array of restaurants/food utopias, all within walking distance; can cook but lacks creativity/drive.

Monday: Breakfast - Cocoa Pebbles | Lunch & Dinner - Sunday affords time to experiment and prepare meals for the beginning of the week.

Tuesday: Breakfast - Cocoa Pebbles | Lunch - $8.00 (Chicken Parm sandwich/Snapple) | Dinner - Final leftovers from Sunday's dinner (as long is it isn't left out)
Wednesday: Breakfast - Cocoa Pebbles | Lunch - $4.00 (Two slices of Pizza) | Dinner - $12 (General Tso's Chicken from local Chinese restaurant)
Thursday: Breakfast - Cocoa Pebbles | Lunch - Leftover Chinese food | Dinner - Pasta in red sauce and grilled chicken breast (Guilt settles in)
Friday: Breakfast - Cocoa Pebbles | Lunch - Leftover Dinner | Dinner - $25 (Full rack of baby back ribs from chain restaurant (alcohol not factored in))
Saturday: Breakfast - Omelet (needs to buy cereal) | Lunch - Ham and cheese sandwich | Dinner - $15 (Pad Thai from local Vietnamese restaurant)
Sunday: Breakfast & Lunch & Dinner - Strong guilt pushes our bachelor to cook and prepare meals for work week.

Total Expenses: $64 (not including alcohol)
This sum isn't so bad (people buy lattes from Starbucks every day), but imagine that this is the typical week. Let's extrapolate this sum: 

Two Weeks: $128 
Three Weeks: $192 
One Month: $256 
One Year: $3,072 
Five Years: $15,360 
Ten Years: $30,720

Again, all this without factoring alcohol, parties, dates, etc. This is a typical week for one person. Simply not eating out on that Wednesday would save this bachelor $576 on the year. Cooking is a daunting task, but one that is rewarding and, quite frankly, impressive.

Give yourself one week, just one to try it out and see how you like it. Everyone is entitled to live how they want, but everyone also wants to try and find ways to save money; here's one place to start. 



   

Google Glass and the Artistic Integrity of Instagram

Social media's most popular applications are intended for sharing with people all over the world. Instagram is no exception, and it is a great way to share the artistic integrity of one's work.

The majority of users, however, use the app to document their daily activities with inscrutable precision. The bottom line is that Instagram is interned in pointless-post-overload.

I cannot speak for the developers of Instagram but I believe they had the intention of inspiring an artistic integrity with a new medium. With camera phones' exponential improvement, photographing the truly beautiful and often overlooked moments of life is possible; Instagram became a tool for sharing those "stop and smell the roses" moments.

Innovation is on the way, though, in the form of a product many view with a dubious outlook. The Google Glass is wearable tech that will have many practical applications: face-GPS and face--video camera to name a few. There are several speculations on what this product could potentially become, and while it's in the Explorer "beta", many more applications will surely be devised by developers and creative early adopters as testing continues. Upon release, Glass' own app store will be brimming with impressive tools, many of which could become official/unofficial companion apps for Instagram.

My two cents about Glass concerns Instagram. The artistic integrity of the application will most certainly see a revival. Stunning new works of art will be possible with a hands free method of picture taking--imagine the photos rock climbers could take? Many of the most popular accounts feature food; aspiring chefs can snap pictures or record video of their deft work in progress. Hands Free tech like Glass will bring true first person perspectives--live as they happen.

Glass accessories can vary to suit all types of activities.

As a personal example, I am a participant of yearly Tough Mudder mud runs in my area. When Glass hits the retail market, accessories and peripherals will be created to protect these devices from harm. It would be fascinating to one day upload live pictures and video of my performance (GoPro will have tough competition), so that friends and family who could not attend the event can get an even better perspective on the action than those who came out to spectate. Obstacles like the Arctic Enema, Cage Crawl, and Electroshock Therapy would be far more intense from a first person point of view.

Glass would be a welcome update to the human experience. New reporters could provide live coverage of events independently; stage performances from Broadway could upload snippets of footage and photos from their performances in a brand new marketing paradigm; spouses could finally end feuds over what wasn't purchased at the grocery store because of miscommunication.

This is, of course, conjecture, and the requirement of accessible WiFi at a Tough Mudder, for example, or mobile network connectivity through a provider would be necessary to make the live element a possibility. Nevertheless, the upcoming release of Glass adds another perspective, one that will, if nothing else, cut down on the rate of "duck face" submissions.             

Black Friday: Do it Arguably Better

When the doors to many retail stores open on Black Friday, it is not unlike the powerful imagery of legions of orcs flooding out of Mordor.

The realm of men ended over a washer/dryer combo dispute.

You run the risk of broken bones and getting into fights over blenders this day. Why do it? As of this time (2:45PM EST), many of the "incredible" deals are no more, so save your war boots for another day.

The following is an example of a superior way to shop online and be privy to sales at a moment's notice.

EXAMPLE: 16 GB Nexus 7 (2013) by ASUS ($230)

This tablet is a hot item this year, and for good reason. Using this tablet as an example, here's something you can do to save yourself stress and get ahead of the competition.

Amazon.com: Put the tablet in your wish list. Save it and leave it there. Checking periodically, I've found the device change in price many times. Right now it is $199, which is a great saving for an already-budget tablet.

Newegg.com: Newegg is a behemoth among computer hardware enthusiasts. In addition to having repeatedly better deals on electronics over several other retailers, you many also customize your shopping experience with alerts: type in the item you want, set a price alert to be sent to your email, and save and wait.

dealnews.com: Make an account with this website and use it year-round. Like with Newegg, you may also utilize an alert system that will send you emails whenever a saved keyword comes up. No more than three hours ago I received this great advertisement for the Nexus 7. If you have Masterpass, you should take advantage of this offer.

reddit.com: Redditors are, for the most part--like the rest of society--kind and helpful people. After doing a quick search of the Nexus 7 and sorting posts by time, I discovered a thread made up of users posting new deals as they find them. This dedicated group of heroes wants everyone to get a Nexus 7 for a great price, and I thank them for their efforts.

All these websites may be linked to your smartphone's email. Imagine, you can go outside and rake the leaves, visit a darling relative, or just sit around and relax, rather than braving the crowds at retail stores or eying online deals all day. Be a savvy shopper.   

Pacific Rim

While this movie looks like a 16-year-old boy's dream come true (and it really is) this movie is a love letter to action summer blockbusters the way they once were.

I enjoyed many of the summer blockbusters the last few years (The Dark Knight Trilogy, The Avengers), but these are superhero movie, and thanks to Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight, they are all brooding and serious. Man of Steel didn't quite get the formula right, even though it did have Nolan as a producer.

The best way to describe this film is that it is a better Independence Day; the films aren't similar (minus the whole saving humanity from aliens thing) in style, but they both feature the heavy pomp and candid attitude that made '80s summer blockbusters so damn entertaining. Pacific Rim is a turn-off-you-brain-and-enjoy kind of movie, but it isn't crude or stupid (think Transformers). On a technical level the film will be a satisfying treat, and had there been time to develop more story and characterization, the film could have been deep and insightful, too.

Guillermo Del Toro loves film, and it's obvious in the work he put in to make this film appeal to everyone while also satisfying his own desires in a film industry that critically lacks any semblance of originality. Pacific Rim is a love letter and pure comic book movie that strikes as hard as a Jaeger's fist.

Flash Fiction

I recently came across an interesting website where anyone may submit a short two-sentence story for others to read. Your writing may be evaluated on a 1-10 star scale and is viewable in its own personal post.

What I enjoy about this type of website is that it's community-based, a place where writers of all experiences may submit an piece of their art. Flash fiction is also a great way to hone your craft/break writer's block. You are given the opportunity to bare down on your language, characters, plot, tone, etc.

Getting a rating is also a nice touch to see how well you stack up. If you've got an idea for a story but don't know whether it would be successful or not, this website provides you with a quick, impartial critique.

Remember to spread the word yourselves. The more individuals who know about this novel website, the better it will be in your interest. Imagine having hundreds of people rating a snippet of your project?

The Name Game

Writing a story is a challenge in itself; attempting to tell a compelling tale with a plot that hooks the reader and to make them care for your characters is no small task, and yet what I find  to be the most difficult obstacle to overcome is names.

Names need to sound natural, need to feel comfortable. Like bad dialogue, if a name doesn't sound right for your character, then the reader will not invest time in reading their story. There are so many elements that a great story can unravel over, but I have a solution for names that will at least get this part down.

They're like free creative stimulants.

It is that time of year when everyone is graduating from college, and there are fewer more suitable repositories for names than a commencement program. I recently graduated from Monmouth University with 1,032 other graduates, all of them with varying names from different cultures and backgrounds (a perk of living in New Jersey). I highly suggest keeping one of these when going to a friend's or family member's graduation because if you're ever stuck on names, this is the encyclopedic source to search.

I've been several times: a name like "Rachel" stubbornly sticks in my mind, but I don't feel like the name suits my character; it's a type of writer's block that is at times more frustrating because you're certain you can continue writing the story if only the name were right. This same issue plagued recently, and so I turned through the pages of my commencement program till I found the right first and last name combination I felt comfortable. I came across the last name "Flook" and was immediately drawn: it's unique, easy to rhyme, and completely fit my character in ways I planned to write her. While I'm still not crazy over the first name "Lauren," I'm glad to have found such a suitable last name, one I never would have come across without this handy program.

Inspiration strikes in the most unlikely places, so go forth and find your own tools to help make writing a little easier.
 

Nearing the End of Graduate School

Grad school is coming to a close and I chose to write something as difficult as difficult things can be: an epistolary, historical fiction novella. In it, I catalog the First World War from the perspective of four different soldiers from four different nations (England, France, Germany, Austria-Hungary). I am in the revision process, and it's looking pretty good. This is as well as I can write for now. I am hoping all future endeavors will continue to be improvements.

Here's an excerpt:

3 December 1914

Dear You Unlucky Bastard,

            NCO says writing is the best way to clear your head. Says it’s important to let your family know how you’re doing. Good idea, except the part about having a family. Any advice for special cases like me? He says to keep a journal. And here we are.

            I haven’t got a clue what to write, and I’m only doing it because there’s nothing else for me to do. Might as well begin by writing that it’s cold. The army gave me nothing to keep warm, except this dingy blanket that couldn’t keep a sheep dog from shivering. The wind blows around too much out here. Getting in my bones.

            I’m somewhere out in eastern France waiting for combat orders in a billet. Several other recruits are doing the same as me. But they’ve got families to write to.

            I guess I could write about myself and how I got here.

            I was born in Paris. Grew up there too. Parents died when I was 5. Both of them got tuberculosis the same time and died the same time. I vaguely remember them holding hands as they died, leaving me alone. Ended up in an orphanage where they taught me numbers, words, and the bible. At first it wasn’t so bad. They treated me well, till I was about 8. Then they expected me to do kitchen work, like scrub pots and clean floors. Things women do. I refused most times.I can still feel the sharp pain from when the sisters hit my knuckles with the rolling rod. I didn’t give them many more chances to do it again. I packed what little I had and left that place on my tenth birthday. It was a present to myself. The first one since my parents died.

            After wandering the city for about a month, sleeping in parks and any place I could find to stay warm, I found the perfect spot. On Scipion Street there lived the old couple Édouard and Claire Dussollier. Their apartment building was nothing fancy, but it was warm and easy to get into the basement. There was a clutter of old junk and dust that hadn’t been touched in years, and they rarely came down. Maybe three or four times while I lived below them. My favorite thing down there was Édouard's old tuba case. I made it into a bed till I outgrew it. Sometimes I pretended it was a castle, and I a king. I called the Dussollier's apartment my home for six years.

            In that time I learned more about those two than I ever knew about anyone. Even my own parents. In a way, Édouard and Claire were like my parents. We never met, but I learned everything I know from them. I read letters from their children, Martin and Gilles, to teach myself to write. I learned patience and pleasure from sneaking Claire’s homemade confiture de fraises. I learned to make memories of a normal life by listening to their conversations above me. Theirs were voices coming down from Heaven. 

So that's just a bit of what I've written so far. This project has been a neat experience/experiment over the last two months, and I'm glad that I chose to write about something as difficult as this. I absolutely had the power to write about anything I wanted; I had decided that the more unfamiliar the writing style and topic, the more rewarding the work would ultimately be. I'm certain I did the right thing. 

The Planted Illusions of Fear

I am in the middle of reading All Quiet on The Western Front as research/inspiration for the manuscript piece I plan on handing in in May, and I have come across the passage that encapsulates the entirety of this novel and World War I.

"But you were only an idea to me before, an abstraction that lived in my mind and called forth its appropriate response. It was that abstraction I stabbed. But now, for the first time, I see you are a man like me. I thought of your hand-grenades, of your bayonet, of your rifle; now I see your wife and your face and our fellowship. Forgive me, comrade. We always see it too late."
—Erich Maria Remarque (translated by A.W. Wheen)

Lunacy

Jim! Where the fava beans at?!

In near unanimous aplomb, which I'm sure was celebrated over dozens of bottles of Opici, Congress voted today (398-1) to strike out the pesky word "lunatic" from US Code.

According to Senator Kent Conrad, one of the bill's staunch supporters, "Federal law should reflect the 21st Century understanding of mental illness and disease, and that the continued use of this pejorative term has no place in the US code."


The only one to vote against it and recently shunned non-believer Texas congressman Louie Gohmert believes that the effort taken to sit around, discuss, and vote on this issue was a total waste of time when bigger issues, say the end-of-the-year fiscal cliff, was sitting on the table. Unfortunately, the bottles of Opici were rested on it, so no one noticed.     

Surprise the Gamer Girl in Your Life

Make sure they're not all Bidoofs.

If you have a lovely lady who's into video games, here's a great way to get some brownie points. Say she plays lots of Pokemon. Grab her game and load it up. Go out and capture three random poke-monsters and rename them: "I," "Love," "You." Next time she loads that bad boy and opens up her menu and finds that—well, say hello to Pantsless Town (Pop. 2).

Little surprises like this can make any relationship shine. Shitty days happen because random unexpected things befall us. But consider how easy it is to turn an ordinary day into a sweet one. This is one way to guarantee a healthy and happy relationship.

She'll slay that spider with "Pudding Lips."

And you can do this with any game where you have the option to input names. Skyrim for example: name a badass axe after her pet name (if you prescribe to such harrowing cuteness, of course).


Go forth and make every day brighter. 

Year End Book Count

This year was a good one in regard to the varieties of books I read, but I certainly didn't read enough. The "A Song of Ice and Fire" series certainly takes most of the blame since I refused to whip through those quickly. In any case, I am glad I managed to get this many in and I'm looking forward to beating this record next year. (It's a good thing I'll be done with graduate school in May.)

Things Fall Apart - Chinua Achebe
The Hound of the Baskervilles - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
The Dark Knight Returns - Frank Miller
Clash of Kings - George R.R. Martin
Storm of Swords - George R.R. Martin
Feast for Crows - George R.R. Martin
Atonement - Ian McEwan
Invisible Monsters - Chuck Palahniuk
Haroun and the Sea of Stories - Salman Rushdie
The Dragon Can’t Dance - Earl Lovelace
Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
In The Heart of the Country - J.M. Coatzee
Breakfast of Champions - Kurt Vonnegut
Blackbirds - Chuck Wendig
American Gods - Neil Gaiman

Collective Page Count: 5,483 (and some of that text is tiny!)
Most Enjoyable: Storm of Swords (for those who know, it's obvious)
Surprise Gem: Haroun and the Sea of Stories (zippy and entertaining read)

How many books did everyone else read and what kinds? Suggestions are welcome. 

Comparative Poetry Drafts

Working on poetry is tough. It's often thankless work that most people read and end up scratching their heads over. It elicits responses like "It's nice" or "Sound's pretty," which amount to little more than nothing. I don't expect a Freudian dissection of the work and there is no right answer, but from now on, non-readers of poetry, make your best efforts to focus on a specific—if only one—facet of a poem that will give the artist the satisfaction of a valuable comment toward improvement.

Below are two drafts of a poem I wrote for my seminar in poetry. The first is what I handed in to be workshopped, and with the help of my peers' excellent critiques, I revised it to the poem below the first for submission into my end-of-semester portfolio. Compare and contrast and let me know what you all think of the changes.

Raconteur

Setting craftsman, you crosshatch revelation

quilts for been-theres and wistful savants.      

Pages pop with organic glow, an ebony clarity

pixelated dreamers take into their wisdom chambers.

You serve tonics marked joy, grief, and misery

mixed specially by your sensitivity for savory scribbles made

into sensory salves. Under honeycombed membranes,

a deceptively voluminous body lies waiting

for the jolt to spring forth from comatose layers.

The void's cloaked edges flake, and strips bow back and collapse

to reveal that brilliant, fanfare-confident  

Ah Ha!

My Sweet Muse

She comes without warning,

never at my behest,

to baptize my blotched mind

in sensory salves marked:

joy, grief, love, and rage.

Honeycombed brain chambers ooze

through to fingers and secrete

savory scribbles

in ebony purity

toward that rich, darling

Aha! moment.