Course Reflection

This is the first art class I had the privilege of taking at UT since starting school in 2012 as an over thirty, first-time college student. I am so glad I made the decision to sign up for this particular course. Through the semester, I learned a lot about digital media. I got to experience a wide variety of topics including music making, photography and editing, and computer-generated art.

My least favorite assignment in the course was when I used Sony Acid Xpress to create a music mashup. While I enjoying singing, I do not know a lot about music and my brain works on a more visual level. Those things made this assignment very difficult for me and while it opened my eyes to a different genre of art, it was not something I enjoyed.

My favorite assignment was the urban landscape photographs I took of Toledo and the finished works I created through editing. Those pictures helped me look at the beauty of art in a different way. It made me realize that a striking image doesn't always come from things that are traditionally beautiful, like flowers and sunsets. It is possible (and enjoyable for me) to capture and/or edit a picture to bring out the magnificence in things that have underlying, often unseen beauty.

I have been wavering in my decision on the major that I want to declare. Taking this course reinvigorated my love of art and has made me lean heavily towards something in the field of art. While my prospective plans are still being narrowed down, I am reminded of the old adage, “Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.” I may not know the exact path I am taking but I now know without a doubt that art needs to be incorporated somehow into my future plans.

Jellies

What comes to mind when you hear the word jellies? Is it this?:

Jars of jelly.
Image from apronstringsotherthings.com.

If you're around my age, you know jellies actually look like this:

Jelly shoes.

Everyone I know when I was younger, owned at least one pair of jellies. These shoes were plastic, made from PVC. They were terrible to wear during the summer (the season most people wore them) because they stuck to your feet and you would end up with dirt patterns on your feet if you wore them outside to play. They were inexpensive to buy so that was a big plus for parents but I don't remember them being particularly sturdy. I remember I wore mine with socks sometimes which was probably similar to wearing socks with flip-flops but it did help with the sticking issue.

Jellies come in different varieties and many colors (some with glitter in them!) and can still be found online and in some stores. If you are really interested, you can look on Amazon. Not my personal preference in footwear but to each their own. :-)

Keep on your toes!

Scholastic Book Club

I have loved to read from a very young age. Anything I could get my hands on, I would read and I loved getting new books. Every once in a while in school when I was growing up, we would receive fliers for Scholastic books and we could place orders for new books.

1989 Scholastic Flier.

The best part would be when the teacher handed out the books a few weeks later after my parents had let me order a couple of things. I remember most orders coming with some free gift whether it was a poster or a pencil, it was always an exciting thing for me.

On top of the order forms they would hand out to us, there was a book fair that was held during the school year.

A book fair that looks similar to the ones I remember.

A room was setup with tables and books and we were allowed to browse and buy books. It was great because it made the enjoyment of reading a full experience from picking out the book to reading the last page. 

Keep reading!

Cassette Tapes/Walkmans

This makes me feel old.

I hate to think of the amount of money my parents had to spend on batteries when I was growing up. My Walkman was probably the most frequently used electronic device in my house, next to the TV. I would put in the cassette tape of my favorite group of the moment and sit on my bed blasting music through my headphones and drown everything else out.

The Walkman
Image from bluedot.net

The Walkman served many purposes. It allowed you full control over your music and it kept your parents from gagging over your selection in said music. It played cassette tapes which made music portable and relatively affordable. The biggest drawback, for me, was always needing to rewind or fast forward to hear the song I wanted to hear. I was so happy the day I got a Walkman that had an automatic "flip" on it to "turn" the tape to the other side when the first side had ended. It was the best invention in my young life.

Of course, CDs came and replaced cassettes and now digital music seems to have almost taken the place of those. It makes me wonder what the next technology will be. I'm sure it will be better than those that have come before, and more convenient. There's always some new technology on the horizon.

Keep rocking!

New Kids on the Block

My first big boy band crush, like most girls my age, was New Kids on the Block. To this day, there has not been another singer or group that I ever loved as much as I loved (OK, worshiped) NKOTB. I owned everything and anything they made and distributed as merchandise. Bed set (pillowcases, sheets, comforter), trading cards, dolls - both plastic and fabric, clothing, posters, cassettes, VHS tapes, books, magazines, jewelry, buttons... oh, the amount of money my parents must have spent!

Oh, memories! I know I owned that same hat and most of this other stuff.
Image from acommonsea.wordpress.com.

My favorite NKOTB was Joey and I never wavered from my devotion to him throughout my adoration of the group. My best friend at the time was a huge Danny fan so luckily we didn't feel like we were in competition with each other.

New Kids on the Block back in the day.

He was so gorgeous!

I outgrew my NKOTB phase but did get a little happy when I heard they had reunited in 2008 and saw a few of my friends were going to their concerts. For me, it just wouldn't be the same. There was something about being a young girl swooning for a group of teenage boy singers that I just don't think could be recaptured.

Keep hangin' tough!

Trolls

I'm not sure what the obsession was with these little things. The phrase "so ugly it's cute" comes to mind, though. I can remember the fad really picking up around fifth or sixth grade.

Troll Dolls
Image from thisorthat.com

We would all bring our trolls to school and show off the newest one we had either purchased or been gifted. I remember getting a few for Christmas gifts during that time as well. I had one that was dressed as a bunny, I had little ones that fit on the end of my pencils, but my favorite was my larger, stuffed troll doll.

Soft-bodied Troll Dolls
Image from eBay

I collected them until some new fad came along to take its place but these wide-smiled, big-eyed, bare-bottomed little trolls still hold a big place in my heart.

Stay trendy!

P.S. Apparently Dreamworks is planning a movie based on the trolls and the origin of their colorful hair to be released in 2016. Hmmm. May have to see that one!

Nintendo

Hello again!

Image from memeshare.net

You were not a true 80's kid if you didn't know the biggest "secret" to operating a Nintendo gaming system. Sure, you could just put the game in and hope that you would see something other than an empty screen but you knew that only happened on days where the video game gods were feeling particularly happy (they were mean, nasty SOB's back in those days). Without thinking, you took that game cartridge, turned the open side toward you and blew your pursed lips across it a few times. That worked a lot of the time, for reasons still unknown to this day. If it didn't work, you tried it as many times as you needed to until it did work. This pleased the gods.

Original NES Gaming Console.

I remember getting a Nintendo as a Christmas gift from my parents as a gift to be shared with my younger brother and sister. Before that, we had played some games on a neighbor's Atari but this was light years ahead of that as far as I was concerned. The first game I really remember playing was the original Super Mario Brothers. Our copy also had Duck Hunt and World Class Track Meet on the same cartridge. WCTM worked with the Power Pad which we also got for Christmas. We would shake the shelves in our house, jogging our little hearts out to the finish line with that game.

We had our Nintendo for a long time and eventually upgraded it to a newer version that proved to be slightly less buggy. I kind of miss it. I know video games have come a really long way from 8-bit gaming but the excitement of the new technology that Nintendo brought with it is a feeling of nostalgia that I'm glad to say I got to experience.

Keep leveling up!

Punky Brewster

Hi everyone!

I recently found and watched the entire four seasons of my favorite childhood TV show, Punky Brewster. Man, did that bring back some memories! I wanted to be Punky when I was younger. I loved her clothes, I loved how funny and pretty she was. She always seemed to do the right thing too. Well, at least by the end of the episode.

Punky and Brandon.
Image from eonline.com, copyright NBC.

If you've never watched Punky Brewster, you may be wondering what it's all about. It is about a little girl named Penelope "Punky" Brewster (bet you didn't see that one coming) who ends up on her own because her father left years before and her mom left her at a grocery store. Punky (played by Soleil Moon Frye), along with her puppy, Brandon, happen upon an abandoned apartment where they are eventually found by the grumpy building manager, Henry Warnimont (played by George Gaynes). Punky charms her way into Henry's heart and he takes her and Brandon into his home to be a family.

Every episode had some message behind it, told through humor and love. Some issues that are tackled throughout the series include alcoholism, death, and drug use which incorporated the nationwide "Just Say No" campaign into a few different episodes..

My favorite episode of Punky Brewster is actually a series of five episodes called "Changes." In these episodes, Henry becomes very ill and Punky is taken from him as a result. The episodes show Henry's struggle to get his family back, no matter the cost. These are my favorites mostly because they really show the love between Henry and Punky through a lot of ups, downs, and in betweens.

The cast of Punky Brewster.
Image from fanpix.net, copyright NBC.

I wish there were more shows still on like this one, that teach good values with family-friendly humor while still being really entertaining. At least this one is still available for viewing through DVD and other online sources. I highly recommend this show for a nice walk through some of the issues faced by kids and young adults in the mid 80's and how one little girl takes on these problems with her foster father, her dog, her friends, and a little bit of "Punky Power!"

Stay unique!

Number Munchers

When I was in school, computers were still a brand new thing in a classroom setting. We were using Apple computers and were required to bring in a floppy disk on which to store our work. In elementary school, with computer usage on the rise, we had one class a day that focused on just that subject. Some days we had to type things and we, of course, learned how to navigate around the computer but my favorite days... the best days... were the days we got to take a break from our lessons and play games.

I only remember two games ever really being an option for us at that time, Number Munchers and The Oregon Trail. Number Munchers was an educational game but it never struck me as that because it was so much fun. The object was to make your way around a grid of numbers, "munching" only the numbers that met a certain criteria set for that level.

This screen capture, for example, shows that you can only pick the prime numbers to earn points.

You had to do this while avoiding the monsters, called Troggles. I'm not sure why this game was so much fun but I've always loved math so maybe that was part of the appeal for me. If you want to get nostalgic, you can find an online version of this amazing game through VirtualApple.org which is an amazing site with a lot of games from way back when.

Stay Troggle-free!