Episode One
Okay, so, maybe I should've expected something to happen.
Anything, really.
Anything.
Like, of course, it wouldn't go completely unnoticed by everyone that I was playing games with the time space continuum.
Why on Earth would I not expect to be approached by two bulky white guys in black tuxes and impenetrable shades?
I guess it was ridiculous for me to not expect that.
Especially fresh out of the shower.
Episode Two
"Mr. Waters?"
Except, really, it wasn't a question. It was more of a bark. Like they knew that they were talking to a boy named Mr. Eli Waters in his bathroom while Mr. Eli Waters was abashedly draping an embarrassingly pink Emma Water's Barbie towel around puny hips that belonged to a Mr. Eli Waters.
Who, also, by the way, is me.
Elijah Waters, 17. White as chalk and your basic gangly boned, slopped haired garage band guitarist, product of Midwestern suburbia, and apparently in a crapload of trouble.
Mr. Big Imposing White Guy #1 flashed a badge in my face, and it reflected off the bright white lights of the bathroom, breaking through the steam of my super hot shower. Mr. Big Imposing White Guy #2 said, "You're coming with us. Bring the device with you."
Sitting in the back of a white van now, I guess I should've figured that lying about having what they referred to as The Jikan wasn't the best idea.
Todd, the strong jawed, blonde counterpart to Rod, the straight nosed redhead, ran the business down to me as soon as I started threatening to break my remote. Although they had it in some special box, I'd managed to convince them that I coded it with a self-destruct option that was activated by my voice.
Whatever my EBay find is, evidently, is quite important.
Important enough to drag me from my shower, coerce me into following orders of pausing and unpausing my family at the breakfast table, and getting me out of school.
"We are members of PRSTC. Preservation and Regulation of--"
I interrupt, droning, "The Space Time Continuum, yeah, yeah."
Todd frowns.
I grin. "Look, you and I both know that I have the power in this situation."
Despite the fact that I was borderline ambushed and most definitely kidnapped...
Todd turns forward again, leaving me to ponder how I will exit this speedily moving moving van without injuring myself. I'd also look quite crazy, since the Imposing White Men only gave me enough time to throw my underwear and robe on.
"Todd," I condescendingly say. "How about we strike a deal?"
Three seconds pass in relative silence, Todd and Rod both keeping their heads straight, looking at the road. I can't tell if they didn't hear me, if they're just ignoring me, or if they're really concentrated drivers.
But, the minute Rod takes his eye off the road, an explosion deafens his response.
Don't worry about me.
I got out just fine.
Somehow.
My vision is blacked out around the edges, though, and I'm propped up in some sort of chair. I manage to keep my panic at bay when I go to stand up and I'm jerked back down. Both my hands and my feet are strapped to the metallic seat.
"Elijah Waters," a voice I don't recognize says from a location I can't see.
A bright blue light flicks on above my head, but it doesn't illuminate any of the room. Just me. Just me in the clothes that I didn't put on this morning.
I mean, no offense to super heroes and ninjas, but I don't get the spandex fix.
Wearing it now, I do have to say it is quite itchy.
About fifteen minutes later, I hear a quiet noise that shakes me out of my nap. There wasn't much else to do in the dark tied to a chair.
Steps of heels are paired with little squares of light illuminating the tiles on the floor, one by one. As the woman gets closer, I see more and more of her figure. The lights all brighten the room bit by bit. She wears the same get-up as I do: a black and navy blue spandex jumpsuit that covers every inch of her except her face, hands, and feet. Her dark hair is slicked up into a tight ponytail, without a strand out of place, and, when she finally gets close enough, I see that her red lipstick complements her eyes very nicely.
She stands at about five foot six and is twenty something.
When she stops walking, the entire room is lit up, and I see that we are in some sort of high tech, spy-like garage. Rod and Todd's van is in charred shambles in the corner, and they are tied up by their hands, ankles, and midsection to two chairs set back to back. Tape covers their mouth. They seem to be unconscious.
Their chairs are wooden, nowhere near as fancy as mine.
"Thank you for providing us with The Jikan," the woman says. I open my mouth to respond to her, because, really, I didn't provide her or anyone else with any type of Jikan, but she raises a hand that shushes me. "I am Myra. Those two men are impostors. The PRSTC does not exist."
I blink.
Myra smiles at my ignorance. "Elijah, what you have is a piece of equipment that originally belonged to me and my team, Mirage. It was developed by an ex-member, Julian Sharpe--"
"What does any of this have to do with me?"
She looks down at her feet, then up at me. With a lick of her lips that does nothing to the bright red color, she pulls a thin white, plastic stick from her sleeve. She presses a button and with a ding, an image appears, little digital photons glittering in the light.
In the image, is me.
"You, Eli," Myra says, "are Julian Sharpe."
In honor of our "Dream" theme, I found two nifty little videos that kind of explain why and how we dream. The first o dips into whether or not it is possible to record dreams.
I think it's pretty cool. The dry erase board drawings are also SUPER cute.
This second video, also by ASAPScience, is about lucidity during dreaming. It teaches one how to go about achieving lucidity, and how everyone has the ability to lucid dream. Also quite interesting.
I saw on Tumblr about Miley's interview with Jay Leno and it really got me thinking. Of course, I dismissed it and kept scrolling, but now it's on my mind again. Maybe it's just on my mind because I'm listening to her song, "Adore You" right now, but Destiny Ray Cyrus has been getting a lot of unnecessary flak lately. And, maybe, right now, I'm perpetuating it, but I don't really care.
It's what she wants us to do, after all.
Ever since the infamous VMA performance, Miley has been called a wild child left and right and people constantly point out the differences that exist between Miley of '06 and the present one. Some could even say that the controversy about how she's going about growing up started when this picture was released of her at a party. But, I'm here to say that the changes she's making, while not completely normally and standard, it's not odd for someone of her age to do what she is.
Am I condoning drug use? No. Am I saying it's okay to twerk with teddy bears and married men? No. I'm just saying that it's not the end of the world that Miley is doing these things. As far as I'm aware, she is only putting herself in harm's way and it's by her own choice. She's twenty one years old and enjoying her life. Irresponsibly, some might argue, and I would see the credit in their beliefs, because it is quite irresponsible to endanger yourself, whatever you do. But, again, people of all ages do it all the time.
Despite the fact that Miley should be taking special care to keep her reputation squeaky clean because she does have impressionable fans from Disney, her Hannah Montana days, and what have you, can she be blamed for how those younger people respond to the way she's living the life that she wants to?
Some would say yes, but I'd say no. I think that it's a parent's responsibility to instill morals and a sense of judgement into a child that lets them know that how Miley is acting is not how you should act. I also believe that they should add that her actions do not make her any worse of a person, either. If anything, it makes her selfish, but, really, she can't keep tabs on how probably millions of sub-14 year olds think about and react to her actions.
Celebrities don't have many opportunities to be themselves without being criticized from every direction for it.
However, in a smart way, Miley's critiques are working for her. Her critics must realize that there is some responsibility in her actions, be they purposeful or not.
She's getting talked about, she's getting press, and she's remaining somewhat relevant with each action she makes.
Unlike Justin Bieber, Miley's outrageous acts are improving her career. There is no petition out there begging for her deportation. Ten, eleven, twelve, and thirteen year olds are not cutting themselves (#cuttingforbieber) in hopes of getting her to stop behaving how she is. She's not getting locked up, drag racing, and running off to Teterboro to escape it all.
That said, I'm not knocking JB. His life is pretty messed up.
With instant success comes instant money. When no one tells you no and not everyone in your 'circle' has your best intentions in mind, running into trouble is oftentimes the only outcome. I wish he was mature enough to stop himself, but at this point he really needs someone that matters to him to step in and do something to control his downward spiral.
From what I've seen, he's truly a great guy that makes awful decisions when under influences and egged on by so-called friends that want to see him fail. I just think he needs a mentor that he really respects to sit down with him and be there. It would've been nice for him to be forced by his parents or something to actually serve his sentence. But apparently they suck at parenting and join him in abusing flight attendants and supply prescription drugs that her abuses.
It might be hypocritical for me to expect JB to monitor his behavior more closely than Miley, but I think it goes to the majority of one's fan base. Most people who follow Miley and are her big big fans are my age and older, and maybe a couple of years younger. We were there when Hannah Montana started, when it ended, and everything that came before and after. And we were old enough to understand that she was and is getting older.
The fans in Justin's fanbase are, as a majority, thirteen or fourteen or younger. The ones that are older than that have enough knowledge and, hopefully, wisdom, to know what he's doing is not the best idea. They have the ability to make logical, mature decisions about how they're going to respond to it. His younger fans, unfortunately, do not.
I think Justin needs to keep in mind that no matter how many tattoos he gets, how much weed he smokes, and how low he wears his skinny jeans, he has 6 years olds idolizing him.
I don't think the same goes for Miley.
This clip is what I was talking about earlier.
This guy is amazeballs.
I don't know, and frankly don't care, how everyone else feels about mash-ups, but DJ Earworm is the absolute best at them. Each year, he mashes up, as in mixes together, in a way of sorts, the top songs of every year. You've probably heard at least one, because all the radio stations play them New Years Day without announcing his name or the name of the song, letting him and his amazing work drift away into nothingness.
And that is not cool.
If it weren't impressive enough that he puts 10+ songs together seamlessly, lyrics and all, there are also videos that transition from one another without a hitch. I don't know if he creates these, too, but all the same they are amazing.
My personal favorite is 2009's Blame it on the Pop, found on his annually updated web-album United State of Pop.
The mashup includes 25 songs.
Seriously, I recommend you go listen to it, and all of his other stuff. To put Kanye, Miley, Taylor and Soulja Boy in a song together and still make it sound good is a mad talent. I'm looking forward to big things from DJ Earworm.
When East Coast native Elizabeth receives her freshman-year roommate assignment, she shoots off an e-mail to coordinate the basics: television, microwave, mini-fridge. That first note to San Franciscan Lauren sparks a series of e-mails that alters the landscape of each girl's summer -- and raises questions about how two girls who are so different will ever share a dorm room.
As the countdown to college begins, life at home becomes increasingly complex. With family relationships and childhood friendships strained by change, it suddenly seems that the only people Elizabeth and Lauren can rely on are the complicated new boys in their lives . . . and each other. Even though they've never met.
National Book Award finalist Sara Zarr and acclaimed author Tara Altebrando join forces for a novel about growing up, leaving home, and getting that one fateful e-mail that assigns your college roommate.
So, disclaimer, this book is only for girls. I honestly cannot imagine any member of the male species pridefully announcing that they read this book.
That said, it's a drama depot and I LOOOOOOVED it.
Normally, I stick to the dystopian/utopian novels: the Hunger Games, the Maze Runners, the Legends, the 1982s and Divergents of the world. I'll eventually make a review on all of these books, I'm sure.
But, anyways, actual review material.
The book features a alternating POV between two girls, Elizabeth (AKA E.B.) and Lauren, who are randomly assigned to be roommates at University of California, Berkeley. The switching is nice, I suppose, because they both are going through very different experiences in terms of growing up during the last summer that they have at home. Also, I'd imagine it'd be very one-sided if we were only to see how one roommate felt about the other and not vice versa. Their voices are also very distinguishable and I never got lost as to who was who.
Each chapter also ends with an email between the girls. As the book progresses, the emails become more personal and the girls really do become each other's best friends, in a way. Elizabeth starts off as the warmer of the two, reaching out to Lauren, but by the end of things they're both excited to meet each other.
Without spoiling the book, I can say that E.B. and Lauren have sucky friends outside of one another, and this is where the writing falls short for me. For as well as Lauren and E.B. are characterized, the side characters that cause the most drama (their parents, siblings, friends, boyfriends, etc.) are flat, in my opinion. They are flat and predictable, and hardly matter aside from the drama they stir. They don't seem to go through any changes at all, which is weird for a book all about growing up, moving on, and going to college.
I feel like I'm smashing the book, because it is quite good to read just for the heck of it, not expecting a master piece or taking anything seriously. I only grabbed it because I thought it was timely to the fact that we are all (mostly all of us, anyways) going to be going to college, near or far, and will most likely go through meeting strangers who will become our roommates while juggling facing "the lasts" back at home. The last time you'll ever eat at this local restaurant, the last time you'll paint at this small shop, the last you do this, speak to this person, etc. Even though it will not, really, be the last time, I can't help but think that it will feel that way. The book did a really good job making these exaggerations relatable, and I felt for E.B. and Lauren as they went through their tribulations.
The emotional bits were handled very well.
I didn't cry, but still.
For me, I'd give the book the same rating as Goodreads, if not a 3.5. Despite all the shortcomings in minor character's characterization, the ability the authors had for conveying the emotions both E.B. and Lauren were going through was fantastic. I couldn't help but feel for them and wonder if I would feel the same way when I leave.
Also, their boyfriends seemed very nice. No douchebags or unnecessary love triangles.That's always a plus.
