A Tale of Two Blogs

The main difference between this blog and my last blog is in content. My last blog was literally a journal. It was where I poured out my thoughts and emotions and life-happenings to the world in all of their glory, sometimes vaguely and other times directly. It was a place to empty those thoughts to the entire world in hopes that someone would read them and know me better. That was my biggest struggle back then, having a desire to be known but having no one to know me. Thus, I took the grenade approach, where I threw a grenade out, watched it explode, and hoped that some of the shrapnel would hit someone. Anyone.

It was unhealthy and I know that now. It's amazing how the use of technology for communication in hundreds of ways can actually hinder our connections with real people. That blog was a pretty good example of that; however, I can't say I would have had better connections with people without the blog either. It's an interesting scenario. That's why this blog consists of specific and topical posts (for the most part). Some you may find certain posts interesting, while some you may not care in the least about them. Whatever. I'm not writing for specific individuals to read (well, sometimes I do). I write about movies, ideas, opinions, specific things that in the moment I have some semblance of affection towards. Either that, or I'm royally miffed about something and if I don't write my opinion I'll have a hard time going to sleep. That happens a lot too.

Having switched to this format has created a problem for me. Way-back-when, I could post daily and I always had something to say (no matter how emo). Now that I've switched to a topical format, I'm lucky to post twice in a week. I don't like that at all. I like writing. I like sharing random stuff. I would like to do it more often. I don't have stuff to write about like I used to, unless of course you want me to transfer my actual journal to the world wide web, God forbid I ever even consider that.

So what am I writing about here? Good question! I'm writing about wanting to write about more. I posed a conundrum on twitter today (follow @andrewols, BAM! self advertisement) stated thusly:

I'm in the mood to be strongly opinionated about something and then to write about it. Problem is, I can't think of anything right now.

If you have any random or interesting ideas, let me know. Chances are I won't write about them. But I am curious to hear what you think would be interesting. Sarah (@sarahlollar) started y'all off with a pretty good idea that I'm not going to write about because I would be required to become too personal about a multitude of situations, but it definitely is a topic I'm quite passionate about, and a topic I ever-so-slightly even hit on in this post:

How about the influence of technology on modern communication? It seems conversations can be misinterpreted quite easily this way

Good idea indeed. What are yours??

UGH! Stupid layout.

I really hate this layout right now, so I'm experimenting with new ones and will be for some time... or maybe just a few more hours... whatever I decide. So widgets, backgrounds, titles, etc, are going away and coming back as they please until I find something I like. 

Currently I want something where I can use images as backgrounds/headers (images of MY CHOOSING), multiple columns, cool looking, hah, I don't know. This may take some work. 

Also, everyone go see Slumdog Millionaire as soon as you possibly can. It comes out on DVD on March 31st, so, that might be the soonest... but holy crap. Best movie I've seen in years. I'll throw a review up of it and The Wrestler, another amazing film, here in the next few days, weeks, or months.

Origins

I've had an online journal since about 10th grade. Actually, let's see, since Friday, April 11, 2003. So second semester of 10th grade. The journal actually still exists (http://www.xanga.com/breadman86), but read it at your own discretion. I probably shouldn't have advertised it just now... you'll get to see how crazy I really am, or have been in the past! I had various websites between about 7th grade (when I discovered the beauties/atrocities of this great internet) and 11th or 12th grade that I updated with posts/opinions, but they are all gone now. I got tired of paying for hosting. Too bad. Plus, the sites didn't scale so well as new browsers came out.

I ended up switching to blogger a few weeks ago after I realized I had more than 1 friend using it, found it to look better, and be overall less messy than what xanga has become. Also, xanga doesn't auto-publish to facebook like it used to for some reason, while blogger does. Nice. Since the big switch, I've been updating more than in the past.

Okay, so what is this place? Why do I have it? What's with the name and the quote at the top? Why should I bother reading anything you have to say? Why do you keep calling it a journal and not a blog?

One at a time! So many questions!

First. . . it's just a place I come to type. That's also the answer to the second question. I'm a slower hand-writer, and I have atrocious handwriting. This is quicker. I can type almost as fast as I can think (yeah, I'm fast, and I'm not humble). Also, I feel that writing is a good way to clear the mind. Sometimes something is bugging me like mad and I have no one to talk to about it, so I'll vent in a journal. I'll write opinions, annoyances, what I did that day, really just whatever I feel like writing.

Now, the third question. The name, "A Hurricane Through Me," comes from a song by Third Eye Blind called "Wake for Young Souls." It's on the playlist to the right if you care to listen. I chose it because I just like the line, "Let the truth blow like a hurricane through me." Really, there's nothing else special about it. I'd just like to think that my mouth/mind/fingers aren't spouting lies all the time. I'd like to think that what I say is true, whether it's spiritually true, whether I'm speaking honestly about myself, whether my opinions are based off of fact, etc. I try not to hide behind lies, try being the key word. The quote at the top comes from "Mrs. Potter's Lullaby" by Counting Crows. It's also on the playlist. I put it up there because I like the line - sure, I believe in shooting for the stars, following dreams, etc, but sometimes it's humbling to look up at a starry night sky and realize how small we really are. It makes doing big things on this Earth seem like less of an impossibility.

Why should you read this? I don't know. If you're a nosy person I suppose you should. If you're a friend who just wants to know what's going on you might want to. Or you can be one of those people that just reads one interesting thing and never comes back. I don't suppose I really care. I didn't make this for other people (for the most part). I made it for me. It's a load off my mind. But it's also here for other people and I'm definitely not opposed to people coming, reading, commenting.

And finally, I call it a journal and not a blog because I hate that word, "blog." It's awful. It sounds like some sort of green-goo prank that gets played on adults on Nick Jr (Hah! She got blogged!). They are journals. Online journals. Public, online journals. POJ. I just made that up, how... not really creative.

I suppose that's all.

Oh, and if this gets published to facebook and you're like, "what the heck, I don't see a playlist on the right," it's because you're not actually at the journal. To get there, go to http://hurricanethroughme.blogspot.com/ . Yep.

That is all.

A relationship I can never keep...

I don't get it. I try, I nurture, I love, I protect, and I rarely ever forget (except for this summer... sorry). But it just doesn't work out. It never works out. For a few weeks it'll work, maybe even a few months if I'm lucky. But there is always an end, always a break. Is it me? Is it them? I feel so lost and I'm sick of starting over! And I never know who to talk about it with, I feel like no one cares when I bring it up. It sounds pretty shallow I guess, but whatever, I don't care anymore. I have to be open.

I have horrendous luck with sunglasses and I just can't ever seem to be able to do anything about it. Ever.

I was HOLDING a pair today as I walked into the library to do some HW - both of which are things I do quite rarely. Holding them. That's it. Not squeezing, nothing. All the sudden I feel something snap and fall. Half of the ear-rest-part-thingy fell off. Just broke off.

This has been happening since as long as I've been buying my own pairs of sunglasses, which was sometime in High School. I've gone through about 3-4 pairs a year. I've had 3 month periods before with 4 pairs of sunglasses alone. I set them down and they break. I hold them and they break. Every so often I'll do something stupid like sit on them. This year alone I've already gone through 4... and now I need to buy a 5th. I killed two last spring, then someone else sat on one back in early May. My favorite pair of all time was lost about 5 or 6 times on summer project (and reappeared or weren't stolen waaayyyy too many times) until finally in Beijing I set them on the bedside table and they broke. First night in the dorms freshmen year they broke by being set on a bedside table also. Luckily in Beijing though, I had a spare I brought with me - I knew my bad luck so I flew over with 2 pairs. Those finally bit the dust about 2 and a half hours ago.

So here I am. Alone in this bright bright world, afraid to look into the sky, afraid of being blinded. Okay, so I exaggerate a bit. Honestly though, I have some pretty sensetive eyes. For as long as I can remember I've been ridiculously sensitive to light. It could be an overcast day and I'll be squinting when I go outside. Sometimes I feel like I should wear them inside depending on the level of light in the room. Weird, huh? Someone with sensitive eyes shouldn't have such horrible sunglass luck.

Okay, so tomorrow I'll probably need to go buy another pair. I've never owned anything more expensive than $15... maybe that's my problem... but I'll probably just buy another cheap pair.

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I've decided that just because this blog is fuggly, it doesn't mean I should wait to write on it until it gets fawesome (made that one up, how creative am I?). I feel good about that decision.

My brain is mush.

Well, maybe, it depends how lazy I get. Not pleased with the look/layout/color scheme... I'm torn between bright and happy and subdued and serious. Also, I don't like the layout options they give me. I went into the HTML and messed with some things but yeah, blah, didn't care to do too much.

I had something I was going to say... but homework + Talladega Nights in the background has turned the brain to mush.

If anyone has any tips of things to add to this to make it more interesting, do let me know. I did xanga since 2003, but blogger and its ins and outs is fairly foreign.

So... I guess that's it!