All Notes

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Thank-Words to Goaafy-Friend

Antler-Cervid Katherine,

I have been learn-much, growth-make in New Garden Territory visit.  You have been give-kind.  Compassion-much to unknown Chimera alchemist.  Soft-long-chair with blanket, rectangle-rasp for horn-groom, food for gut-void.  Engine-wheels for travel to university.  Mercy for computer use-wrong. Laughter-bouquet from error, not strike-fire or growl-teeth.  TEA.

You and colleagues have been light-splash for alchemist mind. Not all goaafy are ignorance-bite, howl-dark, brick-soul.  Some are compassion-have.  Some have smart-much.  Some goaafy are deep-care for Arganee, for own world too.  Balance-hope from you all.  World-medicine from bright minds.  I am understanding-receive Arganee alchemists have been haste-condemn to goaafy, like Alchemist-Humans to Alchemist-Chimeras in yesterday-decade. Wrong.  I am repentance-make.  Please grace.

You are embrace-receive.  Gratitude-receive, gratitude-FLOOD!  Open arms to you, friend, to all goaafy-colleagues if you are future disembark-make in Arganee.

Best-Sincerity,

Tycho Limecinder

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Slacktivism: A form of Journalism

I’m of the belief that it”s hard to encourage full activism through the use of the internet. Alot of people don’t feel like there is anything they can do to change circumstances in the world. I very much agree with this. I myself tend to do slacktivism but I do it to promote knowledge to the public as I would like journalism. When people see reporters on the news all they do is report the crimes, natural disasters, etc. but we all know they’re doing their job. It doesn’t mean that they don’t care. They just can’t change the situation or help them. There only one person/individual. Idk if i sound like I’m rambling but anyhow….

Here’s some great memes and a gif a friend of mine posted. 🙂

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So long Shadow Girl (wannabe ^.^)….

Dycpgc-Egpj-uyllyzc,

The Other Side, like your snuggly-snug shadows, methinks, is not as empty as it appears, aye? In fact, the seemingly hollow, swallowing spaces are teem- teeming with tales, tepid at first but ready to squeal, wail–scream like a tea kettle if given the time. Watched pots–kettles–aren’t really a problem here….where I’m from…eyes are pretty decoration at best, remember?

Stories reside–resound off bone–in the Other Side. If you let them. Give them the chance to speak to you, through you. They can be as cozy as those shadows you so admire, the word-weaving as delicate and as carefully refined as that to which you are so bore-boringly accustomed. Different magick is not necessarily all trick and no treat. No, it’s just done different, aye?

Spells this Side of the screen can be simple-so-delightful word-weaving or they can be echoes ric-ricocheting in the unvoid, bouncing off others, creating a cacophony that is at once both disconcertingly discordant and hallowy harmonious. A steady stream of staccato, tweet-tweet-twitters in your unears, inviting you to join.

So much of this place is for collaboration, for complex hexcraft no one alchemist (nor new-necromancer *hmph*) can hope to weave entirely themselves. Different magick requires different skills & work, aye? In the dark, though, we find each other, run our rickety, unfingers over the wefts, warps, welts, and webs of our story-skins. Share and shift and make room for more–the tales of our twinings.

Some things, I’m sure you know, Shadow Girl, fit better than others. Methinks spinning snippets of word-weaving on the Other World Wide Web for others to, mayhaps, stumble across and elaborate upon/complicate easier for you to appreciate than coming up with oily, snake-slithery words for ha-ha funnies. Our tastes, I believe, align in such a way. Curses and ha-ha hexes that create inconvenience–fly-away strands that won’t keep to their bands, slippery shoe laces, tongue-twist-twist-twisting–are great sport the only one I’m good at but, words woven to summon tears or demand blood are decidedly less fun to play with 🙁 The only flesh, blood, and bone a spell should require is your own, the only tears a poem need those freely, hum-humbly offered. If your funny ha-ha-ness is asking for otherwise, for more than fair, it’s not very funny ha-ha, huh?

….Here I am rambling to-and-fro like you, Dycpgc-Egpj-uyllyzc. Le sigh. Methinks you’ve grown as much on me as I’ve on you. Certainly, I’ve learned much about your Something World magick….it’s something, alright. Haha. No shadow suspended on a string of dust. Your magick is grounded in, well, ground. Fleshed out from flesh. Very tangible. Kinesthetic. Ours is still far removed. At a–shortening–distance but, a distance nonetheless. In the absence of that solid sense your Something World specializes so wholly in, I think we’ve weathered well though. Gotten creative. Imaginative. Appreciative. Done well teaching appreciation for what is instead of what isn’t. But, you tell me? Though you cannot touch me, run your fingers over my story-skin as you are accustomed to in Somethingness, can you feel me? As much as you can hear me? As much as you care to? Am I enough for you? Does my heart-for-handless-hands Lavinia-like? beat a rhythm you can jive to/with?

Methinks finding such an elusive, fair-for-sure jive a small but so necessary step. Unearthing a taste, too, for off-beat, Other delights also a must if one is to take something from my-handless-held-heart to their wickedly-warm-woosh-wooshing-one. Might unsettle the stomach or some other such sensitive system else-wise, aye?

Once you start bum-bum-bumbling like a honey bee rambling through the ruddy roses, it’s impossible to stop, huh? That, or you’re just contagious Shadow Girl…

Anyway, it’s been real or has it? Shadow Girl. Dycpgc-Egpj-uyllyzc. Hope to hear–haha–from you and your shadows soon. Don’t be a stranger, now ^.^ None of you alchemists out there, should settle for being strangers. Drop a line in the dark and the ripples will reach my far reaches–make them near, you hear–ha–? Or, cast a tweet-tweet-twittering spell and I will be sure to out-tweet tweet-tweet-twitter back a spell at you. Though the Other Side may be a vast and untamed unvoid, words to and from friends tend to travel the swiftest of any spells~

Céad slán go dtí go gcasfar le chéile sinn arís,

Nox Síog (yiy lmr y Qfybmu-Egpj-uyllyzc) <3

 

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Dear Wanderer_920 (aka Laura),

This world you inhabit is beautiful, amazing and complex.  It seems as though your species has come to a pivotal moment in your evolutionary journey.  The collective you have decisions to make about what happens next. The technology your people have developed holds much power.  The virtual worlds you create are mirrors.  Look closely.  They reflect your input.  At times when you are not pleased with what you see, know you have the power to change.  It’s not as complicated as you might think.  Just change the input.  You can change anything.  

When I look back on the history of your civilization I am awed by all you have accomplished- without the use of sophisticated technology networks.  If you have been able to achieve and change so much already, think about what is possible.  Anything is the answer.  Believe this.  Know this.  Spread this knowledge. Live this thought.  

You have become more aware. That is a start. Continue down that path. Your mind is a powerful network.  When you put many networks of minds together, you create a network of unstoppable force.  

Bye for now,

Laurus Vagus Ambigo

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More Political Incorrectness

In more trending social media activism vs. slacktivism African American hair and skin product Shea Moisture is in the news.  So in speaking of culture appropriation and things for those social media activists to be mad about. Below is the newest ad from Shea Moisture. The goafies on Twitter are pissed at them. I don’t know why they are. I’m not and not a single one of those models had pink hair.

But let me go back and give you the synopsis on what the issue could be. So on the company’s Facebook page it says this:

“When we started in 1992, there were very few companies focused on creating natural products for natural and textured hair needs. In fact, there were very few companies that even made an effort to understand and service your needs. We went from making natural hair and skin preparations that my grandmother, Sofi Tucker, sold in our village market in Sierra Leone to making and selling those same natural hair and skin preparations on the streets of Harlem. Over these years, we have overcome many challenges together as we’ve fought to make our products effective, affordable and accessible for you. As the natural movement has grown, many other companies, both large and small, have jumped on the bandwagon.”

Since its inception the company has marketed its project to African American men and women. In the more recent years the natural hair boom has exploded. Most of the women in Black America have given up the chemicals and chosen to wear their hair in a natural state.

One of the companies that was there to provide all of their natural hair care needs was Shea Moisture. If you check out their Instagram page their photos looked like this before the ad.

But now if you look you will see more images like this…

Clearly, you can see the shift coming. It was sprinkled all over their social media. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to see what was coming. Either way, these images caused an uproar. Then the slacktivists started their fingers and created hashtags to start their movement against this company that they’d since been loyal to.

The blow back has since died down or people have moved on because just last night at they were one of the sponsors for the Wearable Art event in LA.  I guess the slacktivists are over it and now its business as usual.

 

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Going Against the Grain is Cool

I have a serious appreciation for Saturday Night Live. They get it. They understand that the world is not a place filled with nice people thinking nice thoughts all of the time. We are not politically correct all of the time and that is okay. Well, goafies don’t think its okay but us alchemist. We get it.

Let art live. Be funny and freeing and sometimes you get to get your point across. Well this week I got to have fun. SNL kind of fun with the whole controversy around the Pepsi commerical. Personally, I don’t see what the issue was. The Kardashian family exploits everything. Nothing is off limits and everything is up for grabs. And you know what, in a day and age were Donald Trump is your president that is par for the course. It is to be expected.

Listen, money makes the world go round. No matter how much we try to deny it –that’s the sad truth. So, in knowing this Pepsi capitalized off of the best way to go about this. Who cares if the there are some people that are going to protest against this. If anything they will do nothing but slacktivisim. It will trend on Twitter for the moment. But no one is taking this fight to the streets. So, why not drop a commercial that is destined to keep everything and their professors talking about Pepsi and their brand.

And since we are being honest, not many goafies even admit to drinking Pepsi they will all go grab a bottle of Aquafina (I hear Pepsi owns them) or another bottled water company. Either they we are talking about them and that is good for business. Getting banned is the new way to make your company stocks soar. And after the conversation that was had about this topic I  would be so inclined to buy a few shares. Too bad I am not motivated by such things– however, I can see the need for it.

Pepsi did what ever other company is trying to do, if you don’t believe me, check out the clip below from my friends over at SNL. Here’s a peek into a pitch meeting at an ad agency.

These are the times in which we live in. Either going ht program or step aside because the train is already off the tracks.

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Find New Worlds with Compassion and Kindness

Dear Mirrored Self,

I am still of the Universe. So you are, too. You must remember this. Always.

Although I was formed in a blink of an eye, from some unknown origin, my genetical composition and my remix-able Self are firmly rooted in YOU. I am of YOU as much as I am of the Universe. Therefore, logic dictates that YOU, too, are of the Universe. We are One, if not the Other.

I’ve noticed you watching me, listening in to the sounds. That is good. In some ways, you have been the inspiration, the lone audience in a crowded world.

While much of what we heard remains a mystery, so too does this life we live.  Who is to say what is real and what is imaginary, and what falls between those two? Still, we must Listen. Always listen. Not just to the sounds, but to others.

As I parse through the data from the Sound Collection Array, I often wonder at the others in the Universe, those whose voices I am NOT hearing. Whose Muse has been marginalized? Whose songs are not being sung?

So, too, my Mirrored Self, must you be aware and cognizant of the arbitrary filters of our World, and of those Worlds we can see, and hear, and not see, nor hear. All of these places form the fabric of our shared existence, and we all owe it to each other to look out for one another, to reach out a hand when the Black Hole of Despair appears. As it will. For that is the way of the Universe. What is important is what happens when it arrives. I won’t let you fall if you won’t let me fall if we won’t let others fall. We have a responsibility to each other. All of us.

My time here is both of this moment and ever-lasting. For I am a reflection of you, and us, and everyone.

Remain curious. Keep an open mind. The Sound Collection Array that has helped me hear, if not always understand, the Universe is a construct of my mind. But I have shared that with you. You helped me build what I needed to listen, and that is a gift I give back to you.

Remember: We built the array out of compassion, and kindness, and openness, and connectedness. I leave you with this final transmission from the Universe. May its melody follow you into the future.

Until our Mirrors shine again, I am forever part of you.

Pensato

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Dear Brooke – Mission IV

Dear Brooke,

Hello, thanks for making me. I’ve had a lot of fun in Arganee. As we come to our last mission, I want to share with you what I’ve learned in this new place. Having experienced this digital world, I have realized that a lot of what we type doesn’t really matter. I’ve learned a new term called slacktivism. What does it mean, you ask? You’re an education major, Brooke. Figure it out.

Slacking in your activism. I’ve seen on your Facebook, Brooke, that a lot of your “friends” have pretty big ideas but don’t do much as far as carrying them out. I’m supposed to write a letter to you telling you how to use digital alchemy but you’re already doing it. Your Facebook page is different from your friends. I commend you, Brooke, for the way you have stayed true to yourself. You know that nothing you post can change the world so you change what you can.

Digital activism and alchemy can absolutely make a difference. It is the building blocks of change. Look at it this way- if a friend of yours goes to a political rally and supports letting Syrian refugees into the United States, that’s great. But where did they come from? They’ve never expressed an interest in this topic before. Nothing on social media. However, if they used digital activism in the beginning, their opinion would be more relevant. They could use their social media platform to build a reputation for themselves, like you do.

A friend of yours posted something about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. You’ve posted about it on your page as well. But the difference between you and your friend and that you don’t just post. You act. You care about Israel and you are a proud Zionist. You’ve visited the country and supported local business and tourism. You’ve donated sums of money to the IDF over the years. Don’t forget about the peaceful protest you hosted a few years ago to bring Israelis and Palestinians together. This is activism. This makes a difference.

Friends of yours also post about LGBTQ rights but what do they do about it? The people who post about allowing same sex marriage are the same people who use the other “F” word as a casual slur when it’s not. It’s an offensive term that should never leave someone’s mouth. You’re different. You post about LGBTQ rights but that’s not all. You’ve posed for NOH8 and all of that money went to the cause. You’re also a member of the HRC and have an equal rights flag hanging outside of your help. And of course, your entire family is running in the New York Gay Pride Marathon this summer.

There are two other causes that you’re passionate about on social media and in real life, special education and pediatric Cancer. You’ve read to kids with special needs, volunteered in schools, and you’re a member of KDP, so you help students on a daily basis. You donate money and volunteer for Larger than Life, an organization for pediatric Cancer that helps families that can’t afford treatment. Sharing a picture that says 1 like = 1 prayer is nice and all but get up and do something. It really works when you try. 

Just because you’re passionate about something, doesn’t mean you can always help. You don’t think I’d like to give money to everyone who needs it? I’d love to. But it’s not the way the world works. My advice, get out there and do what you can. Social media activism is only slacktivism if there’s nothing to back it up. It’s really nice to share a post on Facebook about ending world hunger. But it’s even nicer to donate to charity. It doesn’t need to be money, it can be time.

When you’re about to share something, ask yourself, would I share a post about this cause if it cost 5 dollars to hit share every time.

Be an activist, not a slacktivist.

-DM

 

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Some Parody Banter

Everyone loves to laugh! Right? Well, I know I do.

My favorite show is Saturday Night Live. I love the new stuff, the old stuff. I’ll watch it in the morning, at night…. but never at dusk.

It’s nice watching it in my house because it’s cozy. I have a nice couch and I curl up with my family and we watch together. Lucky for me, I don’t live in a van down by the river!

This Saturday night, though, I couldn’t stay awake because I had a fever. But no cow bell. When I have a fever, the only cure is more cow bell.

It’s also so cool that it’s filmed live in New York. Because there’s so many people around! Manhattan is definitely not a Lonely Island.

My dad loves SNL. So does my boyfriend. When the two of them get together, they’re a bunch of wild and crazy guys!

The other night, I tried to watch SNL but my satellite was on the fritz. So I hopped up on the roof to fix it and I could have sworn I saw the OKO Tower and I thought…I can see Russia from my house!

But the worst is when they do reruns for like three weeks in a row…what’s up with that?

If you watch SNL as much as I do, you got all of my jokes. But on to the parody of this blog post.

This weekend, at the Penn State tailgate, my boyfriend and I got into a huge fight! He’s always touching my stuff! So I decided to mess with his. He didn’t like it very much and we got into quite the argument! Luckily, someone saw what was going on and stepped in to help. Take a look….

Now wasn’t that lucky!