Rhianna's Blog

Yesterday, Chicago's Riot Fest and Carnival announced the first wave of bands that will be playing! The show is relatively cheap, only $18 a day, and a little bit more for VIP tickets. Friday, September 14th, the fest kicks off at the Congress theater, and the 15th and 16th are at Humboldt Park.

I've never gone before, but looking at the lineup so far, I'm definitely interested! Frank Turner, Larry and His Flask, Off With Their Heads, Chiodos (original lineup reunion, everyone!), Gogol Bordello, and The Offspring? Yes please! I'm excited to see who else will be announced!

Have you gone to Riot Fest before? Will you be going this year? Who do you want to see added to the linup?

It's time for Cool Stuff! A day late and a dollar short, I know, but there's nothing short of awesome here...

Alyheartscandy - Panda Lantern

Breesays - Say Anything at House Of Blues

Candl1988 - Big Beautiful Hazel Eyes

Desertphreak - Invisibility

Porcelainspider - Mother's Hands

Songsallseven - Day 1: Where I Work: Fat Cat's Music, Books, And Video

Unclelou - Sunset On The Bay

Hey Buzznet,

Last night, I finished the next book of my 50 book Challenge, but first, something a little different. As many of you have probably already heard, yesterday children's author Maurice Sendak passed away. I believe that being read to and reading as a kid contributes to a love of reading when you're older. Besides that, it encourages kids to write something of their own and opens them up to whole new worlds! Maurice Sendak wrote some of my favorite books from childhood, including Where The Wild Things Are, In The Night Kitchen, and Chicken Soup With Rice. As a kid, I had a video of some of his books sung by Carole King that I absolutely loved, so I'll share one of my favorites.

Pierre: A Cautionary Tale

So here's a big shout out to Maurice Sendak; Rest in peace, and thanks for the stories! Who knows, without his books, maybe I wouldn't love reading as much today and this project wouldn't exist! Now to the review...

The Age of Missing Information
By Bill McKibben

I picked up this book at my old school's library book sale a few years ago. I didn't know what to expect from it, but I bought it in a bag of books for $1 type of thing, and I'm glad I did! It's nonfiction, and is written around two vastly different days experienced by the author. The first day, he recorded 24 hours of television from every channel. That's A LOT of TV! Did I mention this was in the mid 90's? It wasn't easy, he had to have a bunch of people record tv on their VHS players, haha! He later watched all of it! The second day, was 24 hours spent on a mountain, exploring nature. The book is sort of a comparitive of how much we can learn from nature and a lack of technology, compared to how little we actually learn from all of the TV we watch (even from news channels or other education based shows).

Like I mentioned, this was written early to mid 90's, so a lot of it was pretty outdated. It didn't factor in the Internet AT ALL, but it was easy to fill in the blanks to see where Internet would fit in. There are parts where he talks about how TV was the last real technological advance to really change our day to day lives. At the time, even computers weren't changing much, they were glorified type writers or only used in offices. Now a lot has changed, and I definitely say the Internet has changed people's day to day lives a lot! Just think about how many hours you spend online, now how many people spend that much time or more so each day. It's crazy.

It's a bit difficult to sum up more of the book because it covers quite a variety of topics, from advertisting to reruns of old shows. It was an interesting read, and I liked trying to figure in what he would think of today's technology and how much Internet has replaced TV. I don't think I would really recommend this book to anyone in particular, it's not really an "EVERYONE READ THIS RIGHT NOW," kind of book, but it is intersting and worthwhile if you're into this kind of book.

Have you read this book before? What book are you currently reading?

'Sup Buzznet! It's week 165 and I think I'll try out posting on Friday's again...since I potsed on Friday last week and this week. Anyway, enjoy!

Jp40 - New York, New York

Kotikiller - Day 118: Philosophy Is Not Going To Be My Future

Porcelainspider - Blossom Heart

Reverie3 - Spring Woods

Stupidbear - Defying Gravity

Twentyears - Autumn

Book 20 of my 50 book challenge already?! That means I'm almost almost half way finished!

Model Behavoir
By Jay McInerney

This book seemed to take me awhile, not because it was difficult to read, but because it was boring. I'm happy to be finished with it and I'm glad I didn't have any expectations for this book.

It's about a celebrity magazine writer whose model girlfriend dumps him. He tries to interview celebrity Chip Ralstan, hangs out with his anorexic, genocide-studying sister, goes to events and drinks, and sees a lot of naked women. He complains about his model girlfriend not having enough sex with him and how he doesn't care for actors or actresses.

It was boring and uninteresting, but I guess I should share at least one positive thing from the book. There was a quote I liked, "Beware the woman who doesn't like other women; she's probably generalizing from her own character." I like it only because it's annoying when people say things like, "I hate hanging out with girls," or "I don't have girl friends because they're too catty, I'd rather hang out with guys." It just seems like most of the girls who say that are usually pretty catty themselves. Girl friends are awesome and stuff, so are guy friends.

Don't read this book, it's pretty lame. On to the next one for me!

Have you read this book? What are you currently reading?

It's the end of April, and that means it's time for another Month In Pictures!

It's been a weird month with ups and downs. It was kind of shitty early on, then got cool for a few weeks, and now I'm good, but there's some lame family stuff going on so it's not all good, but whatever. I worked a hella lot, but managed to hang out with quite a few friends which is always good! Also, thanks to Jess and the boys being out of town, I got their house to myself for a week which was a nice way to relax. I'm looking forward to May and hoping that warm weather will come with it!

MOVIES: The Mask, The Flinstones, Tenacious D and the Pic of Destiny, Bill And Ted's Excellent Adventure, SLC Punk, The Secret, The X-Files (Season 7 and 8), The Chumscrubber, American Beauty, Mermaids, Beware the Gonzo, The Cook The Theif His Wife And Her Lover, The Living Wake, Harold and Maude, Submarine, Patton Oswalt: No Reason To Complain, Comedians of Comedy: Live at the El Ray, Religulous, Melancholia, Rango, John Waters: This Filthy World, Ghostbusters, Ghostbusters 2, Holes and Amelie.

MUSIC: Future Kings of Nowhere, Motion City Soundtrack (specifically, their new single, "True Romance,") Andrew Jackson Jihad, Of Montreal, Ida Maria, Violent Femmes, Larry and His Flask, Noah and the Whale, and Captain Chaos.

BOOKS: Plato's Republic, The Fault In Our Stars by John Green, Self Made Man by Norah Vincent, Bridget Jones's Diary by Helen Fielding, Inception and Philosophy, and Slanted and Enchanted: The Evolution of Indie Culture by Kaya Oakes.

And here are the pictures, of course....

Starting out the month with a derpy picture of my dog in his bandana phase, haha.

My eye was randomly really red and weird for no reason.

My mom wanted new pictures of herself to put on Facebook, and I got a few goofy ones. This one was my favorite, haha. She did end up using any of them because she's really self-concious and stuff, though.

Zeus the night before Easter with our tacky light up bunny that we put in the front window.

What I was supposed to wear to Easter at my aunt's. I didn't end up getting to go because my mom let my sister bring two or three friends with plus my grandma in the car so there was no room for me, and I didn't have money to get gas to drive myself there...so I hung out by myself all dressed up instead.

This is just some of the stuff I keep by my bed....a manatee, Disney toy, camera keychain, stuffed animal from an old Buzznet friend from waaaaaaaaay back in the day, a shell/fossil, and a "Don't Worry, Be Happy" trinket decoration thing.

Jess and the boys went to Florida, so I stayed at their place to watch Darla the dumb, drooling, dog. I do love animals, but I really don't like Darla at all. Besides being drooly and dumb, she's also really ugly. This picture, is if anything, flattering.

I posted a really similar pic of our group at Pride Prom earlier this month, but this is another one from Katlin's camera.

We can't not be weird.

After the dance, when everyone was starting to clean up, the theater kids and a few others stopped by, so we put on like 5 more songs and had an after party. This was to a Disney song. Left to right; Mandy, kid I don't know, Nicky (who I haven't seen a year and I love/miss him, haha), John, and Zac (he dj-ed the dance). Glob, I love my friends. After this we went outside (where we could still hear the music) and were dancing on the stone picnik tables, haha!

The next day, I went to Parkside for an advisor appointment, this is near the front of the building, I guess they don't call it Parkside for nothing! It's surrounding by grass and trees and I love it!

A week later, Katie was home from Florida, but instead of actually being home, she stayed in Oskosh the whole time, so Sam and I went to visit her. I didn't take any pictures while we were hanging out and we didn't get to stay long, but I took this OoTD when I got home. I quite enjoyed this outfit.

Hung out with Randy for a couple of hours and then met up with Adam, Anthony, Jenny, and Nikki. We were going to walk around town, but it was pretty chilly, so we hung out at Webb's instead. Adam, Randy, and Anthony are weirdos.

But they're in good company, because Jenny, Nikki and I are weirdos too.

An OoTD from afterwork one day. I get really lazy afterwork and usually just throw on a tanktop and jeans but I added a vest because I'm fancy or something.

I've been dying to get a second tattoo, so I took a picture of the tattoo I already have and love.

While babysitting I spotted this cute rabbit out the window!

That's all for this month! "It's gonna be MAY!" (Justin Timberlake voice)

Cool Stuff here! Late, but awesome! Enjoy :)

Angrylambie - Clouds Over The Bay

Cosgirl - Untitled

Kassady - Great Balls Of Fire

Martinasatoriova - DIY Skull Tee

Pishelle - Day 110 - Pink Petals

Porcelainspider - Blossom Tree

Toloveandback - Day 49: "It's You Who Brings The Morning And You Who Takes The Sun When I Sleep"

Virtualtourist - Hummingbird

Last night, I finished the next book in my 50 Book Challenge!

Slanted and Enchanted: The Evolution of Indie Culture
By Kaya Oakes

I bought Slanted and Enchanted a year or two ago. I'm actually not quite sure when it was, but I was going on a big kick of assorted pop culture stuff. I was reading a lot of Chuck Klosterman and I was probably obsessing over DIY related stuff too. However, soon after buying the book, I lost interest in it because I somehow got the impression that it looked boring...which makes no sense, but whatever. SO, I finally started reading it a few days ago and I LOVED IT.

It wasn't boring in the least. I loved the writing and pretty much everything in it was new to me in some way or another. I know a bit about zines and DIY crafts and independent music labels, but this focused a lot on the start and peak of some of these things from the 60's up into the mid 2000's.

I was honestly a bit more interested in the earlier stuff about independent zine, poetry, and comic publishing and independent punk bands etc. I did like reading about the later stuff as well, but I think the earlier stuff was really refreshing and interesting. Even as the author points out, things just don't work like that anymore. It's not a lot of small tight-knit communities, instead the style from those small communities has been mass produced and replicated into the mainstream. It really just made me want to start a zine, a local band, create some quirky craft, and start and independent bookstore all at once...mostly the independent bookstore one....and I'd have art shows and poetry readings and local bands play on weekends.....sounds good to me!

Anyways, I really enjoyed this book and I'd recommend this to anyone interested in indie culture, DIY ethics, or the roots and inspiration to some of those hipster bands and styles the kids are into these days! It covers a lot of topics and is written really well. I could actually really see one of our favorite former Buzznet staffers Breesays writing something similar to this. Anyways, go find and read this book, then create something awesome of your own.

Have you read this book? What are you reading right now?

Last night, I finished the next book of my 50 Book Challenge, and I liked it a lot better than the last one!

Inception and Philosophy
Edited by Thorsten Botz-Bornstein
By Various Writers

After finishing Bridget Jones's Diary, I knew it was time to get back into something smart and philosophical, something that would make me think, so I picked up the next of my Pop Culture and Philosophy books, this one, based on the movie Inception...which I loved.

Although each chapter was different, the same ties to philosophy kept popping up, so instead of giving a review of some of my favorite/least favorite chapters, I'll just talk about the two main things that came up.

The first was a Descarte argument. I'm sure many of you have heard "I think therefore I am." at some point, but maybe you didn't know what it means. I first learned about it in my Into to Philosophy class in 2009, and it comes up quite often because it is pretty popular. Descarte was an extreme skeptic and asked how can you trust your own senses since they often betray us? Things in the distance look smaller than they are, we might hear things or see things out of the corner of our eye etc that aren't really there. Likewise, delusional people think they see/hear/experience things that no one else sees/hears/experiences. So we can't trust our senses, that means that everything we percieve, everything we see, hear, taste, feel, or smell, could all be in our head and not really there. The world and people around us could all be imagined. The only thing we can know exists, is ourself. We might not have a body or appear how we think we appear, but we know we exist because we're thinking these thoughts. The thoughts have to be thought up by someone, they don't come from nowhere, and since they're happening, it means I exist.

This, of course, ties in with Inception because we could basically be dreaming everything. In the movie Inception, the characters can't trust their senses. They see city streets and snow fortresses, they feel the pain of getting shot by a projection, but they're not actually experiencing any of it in the real world, only in dreams.

The other thing that came up a lot was the philosophy of Zhuangzi. He said he dreamt of being a butterfly, and when he woke up, he didn't know whether he was a man dreaming of being a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming of being a man. I had never heard about this before, I don't know much about Eastern philosophy yet, so it's no surprise that I don't know about this Daoist philosopher.

This ties into Inception because it shows the way dreams releate to reality. As the character Cobb says, dreams seem real when we're in them, it's only when we wake up that we know we were dreaming. So I guess Zhuangzi was also skeptical (like Descartes) how do we know if this is the dream, or if that is?

I definitely enjoyed this book. Dreams are complicated and weird and this book made me decide I want to start trying to lucid dream. The book talked about it a few times, and since I have some weird dreams, I think it would be cool to try. Another thing cool about Inception and Philosophy was one section, The Most Resilient Parasite. It was my favorite section, probably maybe, which is why I bring it up. Some of the chapters in this section related the dreams of Inception to MMORPGs (massively multiplayer online role playing games). If you happen to see the book at a book store and just have time to read a chapter, I would suggest one of those because some of the similarities are insane!

This book is definitely for HUGE fans of Inception, people interested in philosophy or dreams specifically, or philosophy in general!

Have you read this book or any others in the Pop Culture and Philosophy series? What did you think of the movie Inception?

It was an amazing week here on Buzznet so I have super amounts of Cool Stuff to share with you, so let's get to it!

Ashkash - Day 17

Audreymouillaud - Unable To Forget

Bizarreland - Bizarreland Celebrates 5 Years On Buzznet

Clarissabrucato - Loud And Out Of Key

Desertphreak - Remnants

Justxbass - The  Night Sky

Rrice - Birds

Shemovesinherownway - 52/52

Toloveandback - Day 47: "You And I We Were Born To Die"

Unclelou - Aurora Borealis

Whatsxherxname - More Hurricane Katrina Damage