Frivolously Follow Me this Friday! (Numero Seis)

"Follow Me Friday" is oh-so-wonderfully hosted by Parajunkie's View and Alison Can Read. So what question is inquired today?

Do your reading habits change based on your mood?

Hell to the yeah. When I find myself in times of trouble, Mother Mary comes to me, and my reading habits change drastically. The much simpler novels on my bookshelf instantaneously become more attractive, and I  might not even complete them. Although relaxation by cracking open any kind of novel would probably help me calm down, my stress-engulfed mind will probably prioritize the problem at hand over reading. A relaxed mood, on the contrary, makes the more complex reads on my bookshelf seem just dandy. It is during these times that I venture into classic authors as well as longer works by modern authors (such as The World According to Garp by John Irving--a post about that one is in the works, I promise!). 

     Now, let's get funky with this subject; funky meaning philosophical, of course. Moods usually come about because either one sees the events happening to him as similar in nature, or one event is so potent that it overshadows everything else. An unwanted mood can therefore be solved in two ways, the first of which being that if a person has a case of seemingly similar, repeated events, he should attempt to think about how those events are different. Find optimism in some event if you are surrounded by pessimism in most events, for example. The other way by which an unwanted mood can be solved is, if one event is potent enough to overshadow everything else, attempting to think of reasons why that event isn't so potent. Why that event isn't so powerful.

      Because more powerful than any event or series of events is the human mind.

*PS: Please follow by R to the S to the S!  

Frivolously Follow Me this Friday! (Numero Cinco)

"Follow Me Friday" is hosted by Parajunkie's View and Alison Can Read. This week's featured blogs and therefore supreme administers of question are Oh! For the Love of Books and Ezine of a Random Girl, both of which are also composed by immensely interesting people indeed. So what question have they inquired of us today?

Activity: Take a picture or describe where you love to read most...

I actually have a tie. In first place, we have:

The bed in my grandma's guest room. This is the place where I sped through Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone as well as cried when Mr. Potter waved his children goodbye. It is also a place of immense frustration during the school year...thank you so much for that, AP Chemistry. Really, you're just a doll.

Another favorite spot of mine is right in front of my house. One usually sees me there each morning of the summer, watching the neighbors pass on daily strolls. The breeze on pages of a book is a phenomenon that awes me to this day.

Where we read is as important as what we read, because reading is never simply words on a page. Although said words may be the lead actor, who's to say your environment is not the supporting actor (a category which Max von Sydow should win HANDS DOWN at the Academy Awards this Sunday night) ? If I read Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone in the sewage drains of New York City, my mind would probably not associate the book with childhood comforts, as it currently does. Same text, different experience. And it is the reader, not the book, that will affect in the larger scheme of Earth.

All you must to do "follow" me is click on the RSS button above. Thank you, wonderful people!

Frivolously Follow Me this Friday! (Numero Cuatro)

"Follow Me Friday" is hosted by Parajunkie's View and Alison Can Read. This week's featured blogs and therefore supreme administers of question are The Book Addict and Books and Beyond, both of which are also composed by immensely interesting people indeed. So what question have they inquired of us today?

It’s Thanksgiving Day in the U.S. so we want to know what you are thankful for – blogging related of course! Who has helped you out along the way? What books are you thankful for reading?

How excellent, considering today is my blogoversary! Anyway, I would say that, above all, Kerrin at My Kugelhopf helped me establish this blog in the first place. Her blog was the first I ever read, and after enough minutes drooling at the beautiful pictures of pies and pastries and cakes and knishes she has taken (please do yourslef a favor and scurry over to see them!), I started paying attention to the concept of what I was reading....your life, on the internet....a main focus...no editorial board to get through. Hey, this thing called a blog was pretty sweet.

Now....books I am thankful for reading? My top two must be:

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by J. K. Rowling
This book is why I write. As an eight-year-old, I saw the fantastic world Rowling created and immediately wanted to have that, to have a place where every detail flowed from my pen, where my mind was supreme (I wasn't the most usual eight-year-old...)  My first story was about two abandoned Arctic foxes, quickly followed by an attempt at the Great American Novel. I have been attempting ever since.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
To sum up this book in a few words, "The Catcher in the Rye with a better theme." I was astounded with how well Chbosky recreated the situation of an unconfident teenager in an arrogant world. The medium used-letters to an unnamed "friend"-proved to be absolutely genius. So much did I adore this novel that when I discovered how so many parents discourage their youths from reading it becuase of "offensive content", there was nothing to do but formulate an argument against such censorship-you can see the products of this effort (and comment about what you think!) here.

So why do people have need to give thanks in general, one may inquire? It truly is related to fear. The Pilgrims feared their future, so they decided to dwell on what they possessed at the present moment. My schedule might resort to overload this year, causing me to not read a single world until Finals week. Entire families gather round tables and stuff themselves with American staple-foods because, well, who knows if someone will die or become broke or commit suicide in the coming year? Humans are used to controlling everything. They cannot control the future, but they can  dwell on their present so much so that the future is nonexistent.

Frivolously Follow Me on This Friday! (Numero Tres)

"Follow Me Friday" is hosted by Parajunkie's View and Alison Can Read. This week's featured blogs and therefore supreme administers of question are Lisa Loves Literature and Once Upon a Prologue, both of which are also composed by immensely interesting people indeed. So what question have they inquired of us today?

If you could change the ending of any book (or series),

which book would you choose, and why?

*Warning: Spoiler ahead for The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson.

If you have not read it, get the hell off this page and PICK UP THE BOOK!

Almost every book-lover I know has devoured this novel as if its very words are heroin. Currently, the ending includes our ever-fascinating Lisbeth Salander deciding to subtly display her affection for Michael Blomkvist, the person who she has worked and slept with during the Harriet Vanger case, by purchasing him an Elvis Presley sign from the 1950s. However, the journey she makes to give this present ultimately shows her a prophetic portrait of Blomkvist and his occasional lover, Erika Berger, holding each other lustfully while on their way to Mikael's apartment. Lisbeth then departs from the scene and throws her gift into a dumpster, furious
     Now, this is quite a wonderful culmination since it really depicts Lisbeth's struggles to cope with the average life. But tossing that gift in a dumpster because she saw her potential lover with another woman is an action Elle Woods would perform. I want to see Lisbeth completely overcome by emotion and scare herself because of how overwhelming emotion is. I want to see her reaction to a much more shocking portrait.
     I want to see Blomkvist lustfully holding businesswoman Harriet Vanger, the missing individual who he located in rural Australia, instead

     And I desire that Lisbeth look at the two for a second and initially feel the equivalent betrayal she feels when Blomkvist is with Berger. Being Lisbeth, the woman would then become spooked to the highest feasible extent because she permitted her emotional thoughts for Blomkvist to overshadow her logical thoughts about how utterly unrighteous the couple's existence is; this relationship may cause him to have a bias towards the Vanger Corporation in his financial journalism. But the real core of the aforementioned event is Lisbeth realizing just how dangerous emotion is to the logical world. I want her to think, Is it really worth the risk?
    

Frivolously Follow Me on this Friday! (Numero Dos)

"Follow Me Friday" is hosted by Parajunkie's View and Alison Can Read. This week's featured blogs and therefore supreme administers of question are Jenni Elyse and Caught in the Pages, both of which are also composed by immensely interesting people indeed. So what question have they inquired of us today?

In some books like the Sookie Stackhouse series, the paranormal creature in question "comes out of the closet" and makes itself known to the world. Which mythical creature do you wish this would happen with in real life?

 

 

This will probably not be the average answer, but I would definitely choose ghosts like that of Marley in Charles Dickens's A Christmas Carol. There are so many humans who share the condition that both Marley and Scrooge inflict on themselves: being completely oblivious to the greater world. We focus on our individual realm of work since, according to us, any other matter on Earth is really just some breed of distraction. A more common label for this condition is "being a workaholic."Although this doesn't necessarily mean that every workaholic is Ebeneezer Scrooge (I certainly like to think that I am not despite my friends saying differently during final's week), we all share a shrewdness and occasional disregard for the needs of others. Shrewdness can help us disregard the needs of ourselves as well-our need for that distraction. A balanced life in indispensable. The existence of ghosts like that of Marley can remind all workaholics that other phenomena than work are important in one's life. We will probably not be forced to roam the world in chains after death, but a harrowing and cautionary depiction of regret will be presented so that we do not ignore the world in chains during life.

Frivolously Follow Me on This Friday!

"Follow Me Friday" is hosted by Parajunkie's View and Alison Can Read (didn't I tell you how HARD we book bloggers party?). This week's featured bloggers and therefore supreme administers of questions are Stuck In Books and Belle Books, both of which are composed by immensely interesting people, I might add. So what question have they inquired of us today?

If you could write yourself a part in a book,

what book would it be and what role

would you play in that book?

     Indisputably, a younger brother of Melanie in Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell. When Melanie is in Atlanta with Scarlett, I would just love to be an indispensable asset to the two of them as they endure those horrid days of Civil War. I would be a person of the utmost benevolence, and when the Yankees are about to put Atlanta under siege, I would stay with my sister, later aiding both her Scarlett once Rhett has left them in the wilderness outside of Georgia's capitol.

     I also imagine me acting as an older sibling to the child of Scarlett, who is without a dominant male figure, once Melanie, Scarlett, Beau (Melanie's son), and Wade Hamilton are taking refuge in Tara after their escape. This is especially imperative because a child must be surrounded by diversity from an immensely young age. How successful can a man be if he is not comfortable with other men? The same would occur if a child is never presented with the existence of racial minorities-How successful can any person be if they are unable to deal with people ethnically different from themselves? An African American who cannot deal with Asian Americans? A European American who cannot deal with Mexican Americans? Any people falling under the aforementioned conditions would be simply incapable of satisfying what life expects from them since life, in the end, knows no color, no gender, nothing but which humans are capable of living. And that is a great amount of us.