Future

Okay well I tend to be a realist when it comes to thinking about my future. Below were post about my career which consisted of working in the gaming industry and maybe in movie industry at some point. After my main career path I may choose to go back and teach I have always had this thought I would be a teacher in the end. I don't plan to have kids but I would love to be a really awesome aunt to my sisters when she has some. Live in Cali until I realize is insanely busy and way to crowded. I see myself traveling a lot once work is going slower and I don't have to be in crunch time all the time. Maybe getting married if it ever works out. Past my future the world its self is already starting to fall apart so I guess at this rate it will continue. Maybe our overpopulation will hit the world and cause more hunger and overall pollution will follow. To be honest the future looks good in some cases but overall not that great. People are too lazy to change and only do it if it directly effects there health and or income of money. People are greedy and selfish and won't care until its way too late.

"How do you see your future in the year of 2027?"
    How I see myself in the future is working in the game industry either for a company or myself. Probably living California maybe L.A. in a apartment. Not married by any means and no children. I would have a german shepherd by then or some from of animal. The environment is going to be in bad shape because everyone took too long to start caring so going outside or simple the area around me won't be in the best condition. I know I will still be paying off Ringling and all the loans from collage. Hopefully I will have enough time band money to where if my sister is not near by I can visit because we are always trying to stay close. Being in the game industry for that long I could get burnt out and switch over to film or maybe even teaching in I wanted to I have always had this thought I would end up teaching at some point. Overall I see my future being good if I work in a good job in the game industry sense that is what I trained for. Having a life outside of work because I would be past entry level at that point.

"How do you you see your future in the year of 2050?"
   By then I would not be working in the game industry I would have quit years ago probably due to unfair treatment, lower pay, crunch time being difficult, and I would be burnt out. By then I would have probably picked up teaching and still might be teaching at that age or retiring soon (hopefully) Living wise I would live right outside of the city in the country sense after all the years of living in the city thinking thats what I wanted, Ill come to understand that I miss my childhood of having open ranges and less people around. By then the world has hit a even high number of over population and our resources are lacking. Farming will become a very important job for most people. The environment has completely run a muck will high sea levels, junk everywhere. Sense we stopped caring about NASA our space program is only just now trying to leave planet Earth. To be honest I would see myself not being alive by then. I always though I would die young because of a weird health plan or some accident.

"How do you see your future in the year of 3000?"
  Well I made it to 117 years old, that sucks. This sucks because who would want to be that old you can't do much when your bones are bad, and your heart is stopping soon. I am not a optimistic person so I would not want to be alive then. The world is probably still going about its day with poor environment due to our lazy world of people. We have had to adapt to our new way of life without much. Were there is a lot is our technology because as a lazy race thats all we have come to know. Jobs are replaced by robots and we are not needed as much anymore. What did I do with my long life? Well I am part of the last good generation to go through this planet because we were not completely induced with technology as much as the one behind us. I still grew up on a farm with just the enjoyment of outdoors and my family. I grew up to work in the gaming industry and later quit to be a teacher. I saw the world in as a realist and knew it would fall apart. Wars have come and gone, people have killed one another over stupid selfish matters, education has fallen due to taking away vital key subjects in our lives. Artist are still probably viewed as a lesser profession. By then hopefully I still have money to support myself. I may have gotten married but we never had kids. My sister may have pasted away being 7 years older then me. Overall I am probably on my way out and trying to leave behind a why of showing that we made the mess we are in with our world no body else and it is our job to fix or try to re create a better system. But knowing how history repeats ourselves nobody will do anything or not enough people. Dark way of looking at it but if you look around us now you could see this. If I could choose I would choose to be dead at this point.

Week 14

   

     This week I’ve listened to I Think We’re All Bozos on This Bus which was definitely much different from what I am used to. It took a while to get used to the audio story telling, but it was defiantly surreal and very interesting. Uhm Clem is hilarious on his attempts to confuse the computers, and in a way pointing out how over reliance on technology that lacks common sense is a poor way for the future to run on. Over all was worth my time being very limited at the moment because of other class work but I have able to keep on top of my work some how even though I never seem to sleep. Aside from that I chose to edit this post after going to class. We watch Idiocracy in class I was laughing at the reactions from my friends who had never even heard of the movie. I believe the satire is very clear in this movie once you get passed how stupid it plays out. I believe our world is slowly but surely becoming this movie. Its like the movie is just the extreme of our own reality or what it could be. Having a money, weapon powered president thats too dumb to even run anything be in charge with a population of brainwashed citizens who are too dumb to think for themselves.

Week 12: Reading Assignment

1. What is your reaction to the text you just read?
 
 Well to start I mostly read sci-fi novels so reading about aliens is not all that bad. Although I was confused at the beginning about who was human and who was not. The idea of people eating or drinking from the egg creating some form of a drug was interesting. Our man character went through a odd experience that I guess in the end they knew in advance would happen. Such a odd story where this alien takes care of your family only to pick one of the children and raise it to be close with her so that they may carry her children. Evening going to the extent to explain the birth process in which our main character will one day have to do. To be honest I don't see why they chose to have the main character be the one in the end to carry her young when she could of gave it to someone else who wanted it. I know he suggested that in the end that he wanted to be close to her but prior to that he was planning to shoot her with a rifle stored away.

2.What connections did you make with the story you just read? Discuss the elements of the work with which you were able to connect.

    Well I will admit this question is harder to answer because I found the reading to be a little unclear only because I would probably need to read it over a couple times to fully understand it. But I guess what I understand from this question is that you could soon tell who was who based upon there reactions to events that played out. To start our main character seemed to be growing still but greedy, brave yet weak. He was treated the way he was because he would seem be caring the young of the alien he didn't know this from the start but multiple hints are thrown in. The way he is seen by this brothers and sisters and mostly his mother. His mother is pretty much a definition of time, she wants to grow old so she refuses the egg each time unless told to by the alien. All events lead back to drinking the egg which makes clear connection of the ability of the egg and the culture surrounding it. The author is bringing multiple elements into the story by setting up the characters making some more dynamic then others. Giving a plot that was unclear in the beginning but came around towards the middle. Also the basics of giving a clear setting of the time and location helped grasp the narrative.

3. What changes would you make to adapt this story into another medium? What medium would you use? what changes would you make?

    To be honest I could see this being seen on a tv media form. I understand this is a short story but it leaves with a ending that be continued. I would say a series of shows would be a form of media or film for formal terms. Setting up the background more by explaining more about the reserve and why things are this way. Later setting the characters out how they all came to be or why they are together. Later ending with this event of our main character being the "one" in a sense chosen to bare the children of the next generation. I think this form of media would best describe the story provided by the text written. I would give more background information on the aliens and the eggs they have humans drink because a lot of the story relates back to the egg and its powers.

   

    

Week 13

    Like her best-known novel, The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood's new Oryx And Crake begins in a seemingly alien future, then dips back into the past to show how it came into existence. But unlike Handmaid, Oryx And Crake focuses more on the past than on the strange new world that followed; where Handmaid was a dystopian adventure, the new book is more of a speculative elegy for a consumerist, arrogant society Atwood perceives as being not far from our own. Atwood channels her story through Snowman, a man who lives in the wreckage of the civilized world, where ordinary items like hubcaps and bleach bottles are ancient artifacts to the survivors around him–people without facial hair, people who heal their wounded by purring over them, people who are utterly without aggression, resentment, jealousy, or anger. Snowman refers to them as "Crakers," and functions as sort of a cranky elder shaman to their tribe, pretending to possess a wisdom and knowledge he lacks, and hiding his weaknesses from them while eking out a desperate, solitary living in the rubble. Oryx And Crake eventually dives into his memories of growing up in a socially divided world where genetic engineering was the wave of the future, and where scientists and technicians crowded into luxurious but rigidly controlled corporate arcologies to create the next wave of designer foods, drugs, and animals they would market to the suffering lower classes. And, as Snowman remembers, the connections begin slowly falling together. Oryx And Crake is somewhere between a Neal Stephenson future-tech novel and Richard Matheson's I Am Legend: It focuses closely on the day-to-day trivia of life both in a decaying, overcrowded world and in a post-apocalyptic, near-empty one, and it's packed with fascinating ideas. But in its focus on high concepts and ground-level details, it tends to leave out the middle ground. 

Week 12

    Lets face it, aliens, in popular media are most often insipid, and completely leeched of any psychological or sociological depth, there is almost a inverse relationship in many alien films that the only beings capable of technological ingenuity of any kind must somehow be monstrously depraved. As a human race, we are eminently arrogant enough to circumscribe our alien characters to the mold of being entirely dimwitted, monstrous, and easily domesticated, and easily eradicated above all else. The premise and themes behind some of the lyrics only deepened and crystallized in my, and i was reading Dawn like I did for Interview with the Vampire. This greatly enlightened me on the deeper directions fiction can take.

Week 11

    Snow Crash has one of the most effective opening hooks in science fiction, a loving description of a high-tech armored driver and car. A man with a mission. A man with wonderful high-tech toys and samurai swords, who works for the Mafia doing one of the few things that the United States still does better than any other country in the world. High-speed pizza delivery. It's a beautiful setup, even if the pizza delivery job doesn't last far beyond the opening pages. It introduces the reader to Hiro Protagonist ("Stupid name." "But you'll never forget it."), the skateboard courier Y.T., and some of the major players and political structure of Stephenson's future Los Angeles. Even better, it effectively introduces Stephenson's off-beat world, in which things like Mafia-owned pizza chains and franchised private countries guarded by dogs with nuclear power packs not only prompt an amazed chuckle, they start to make a bizarre amount of sense. The easiest box to put Snow Crash into is cyberpunk humor, and it certainly works as that. Stephenson's characters approach an insane, satirical world with an unflappable, sarcastic attitude, full of choice comments and well-timed skewering of idiots. But he's not content to just give the reader humorous ideas. He digs beneath the surface, filling out the corners and edges with bits of trivia and extrapolation, resulting in a highly improbable world that feels, while reading, like a living, breathing place just a few exaggerations around the corner from our own.

Week 10

 

    I choose to read a different book for this week. One that I have grown to love because it is different. Reading books have never really been my favorite hobby but this book reminds me that there are books for everyone. The book I chose to read is Ready Player One. This book takes way into the future and overall relates to video games and a young boy with one dream. After reading it and looking over much they relate it to what our world could be its kinda amazing. The idea of using VR to teach kids and then apply that to there everyday life. The book goes over many kinds of video game history lessons and I take it all to a personal level being in game design. I am writing in a different format for this week because its very personal. Being in game art I have little time to even play games anymore and being assigned books that can some how relate to what I love is great. Ready Player One was written very well and by far favorite book of the year so far. I hope to continue to find books like this one so I enjoy reading. The characters are well developed, dynamic, and have multiple details that make you connect with them on so many levels (no pun intended). I think you should really consider adding this to the list of books to read by far a great one.

Week 9

   

    Shards of Honor was written in 1986, and is solidly within the romance novel genre, but with some twist. I'm not going to get into the details of the planets and the politics but basically, Commander Cordelia Naismith is on a planet, taken prisoner by a guy named Aral Vorkosigan, they have to work together for survival, etc. The plot thickens when Cordelia ends up on Aral's ship, there are various plots and mutinies and Aral and Cordelia are caught up in politics and doomed to be apart because they are residents of two warning planets. My enjoyment of this book was hurt most by the characters, who are sad, hollow creatures with emotions skittering off their surfaces and never reaching any deep significance. There were times when the characters were supposedly happy, terrified, or despairing, but I only know because that's what I was told by the narrator. It's one of the worst cases of characterization by telling rather then showing that I have read. I never felt connected to the characters which is odd. The romance never became credible, remaining a bad example of love at first sigh. My biggest problem with the book was the hard time I had keeping track of the characters or rather a hard time matching characters to names. 

Week 8

    
    My first impression of the characters was fairly negative and the plot didn't seem particularly inspired, yet for some reason I just couldn't put the book down. Gaiman manages to evoke a really interesting world despite telling what is at first a pretty ordinary story with unremarkable characters. My opinion of Gaiman has gone up by witnessing this first hand. In addition to the engaging tale, it's also quite funny! By the end of the book I was ready to praise it. The characters really evolve before your eyes and the story takes off. I'm glad I read it despite my initial hesitation. Anansi Boys is set in the same universe as American Gods, but it is a completely different style of story. The only things these two books share is the way gods, magic, and spirits are portrayed, and the character Mr. A. Nancy, also known as Anansi. The main premise is, quite simply, that gods are real and hanging out on the Earth. They have great powers or miracles that they can use to change things according to their nature. These gods are generally secret with respect to most of the world, but certain cultures or groups of people are more sensitive to their spiritual natures and know about the gods and magic.  This book, as well as the two others I've read, have convinced me that Neil Gaiman is an excellent writer and one to keep reading. I personally found the book to be more accessible than American Gods and would recommend it over that one. Despite the initial hesitation given the main character, things quickly sped up and became very enjoyable.

week 7

    So when I was a kid I didn’t enjoy reading one bit so I missed out of the crazy hype that came along with this book. I just was afraid of the size of the books because they appears to be too long and I was not interested. Looking into it now the read was very easy of course but had to admit it was good. I can read this book over and over again. From the very beginning until the end J.K. Rowling has me gripped! There is never a dull moment, whether it's battling with trolls, a three-headed dog, or Harry facing Lord Voldermort. I would definitely recommend this book because it keeps you reading without ever wanting to put the book down. By the end of the book you come to love the characters and you want to read more. You won't be disappointed because the second book in the series, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets is just as great! If you haven't read any of the Harry Potter books. I started reading the second one and I probably will read the rest.

Week 6

    This is one of the most freshly original and delightfully imaginative books for children that have appeared in many a long day. Like "Alice in Wonderland," it comes from Oxford University, where the author is Professor of Anglo-Saxon, and like Lewis Carroll's story, it was written for children that the author knew (in this case his own four children) and then inevitably found a larger audience. n interesting book, and a sadly disappointing one, in a Harry Potter kind of way. The book seems to drag on and parts of it seem pointless, useless even, and adds little to the story line or the characters. Though there were attributing parts of the of the story that makes it more bearable to read. For example, at the beginning it was quite humorous in a way that today’s readers might find funny, rather than being old-fashioned. Though, I guess this is almost always exactly the same in all of Tolkien’s work. The Hobbit is one of the longest short books I have ever read in my life, because though it is relatively not that long it feels very long and over drawn. When reading this book it can feel difficult because of all of the facts. Definitely not the best book I have ever read and has many flaws and issues but is still a good piece of well structured writing and does deserve some credit at least.

Week 5

   At first, Aunt Maria seems to be a demure old woman, cuddly as a teddy bear and oozing forbearance and patience. But there is a hard, iron side to Aunt Maria that can hardly be believed at first because it is cushioned so sneakily between layers of fluff and sweetness. But gradually the Lakers realize that they are expected to keep house, look after Aunt Maria, and provide the cakes (home-made, not store-bought, mind!) for the tea parties that Aunt Maria has every day with other women from the village. Aunt Maria is not very exciting or riveting; it’s mostly dull with a few bright spots here and there. I think Jones’ point ran away with her a little bit and really just overshadowed the entire book. Mig’s mother was fantastic, though. It’s better than a lot of other Middle Grade stuff out there, but Jones has written better books. The whole male/female magic thing was just…weird. It was all, “No, men and women are the same, really! It’s when they’re treated as different that things go wrong! See, look, we shut away all the men’s virtue in this box because that’s not manly! And all the women dress like they’re from the Victorian era because patriarchy rant rant!” First, that’s just a bad way to make that argument. Second, it really just overshadows the entire book. Third, what do the characters even learn from this, anyway? Nothing! Everything remains the same. If you want to make the point this obvious, then at least show some change.

Week 4

    American Psycho was a weird book overall for a read. I will admit I have read this before and this is my second read because I wanted to go back and see what I may have missed the first time reading it. If American Psycho has a thesis, it’s that certain types of people are so obsessively set on outward perfection that they miss the real substance of being human. Money and beauty insulate these people from regular needs but create a hypertrophied rivalry over status: the novel’s characters boast of paying more than they really did; they seek relationships for show rather than companionship. When Bateman continues his exhaustive detailing of designer clothes while tearing apart the body of a sentient human being, he’s showing us where a culture of vanity takes us: to a place where the label matters more than the person. This would thematically justify the violence as a ruthless way of showing how little other human beings matter to the type that Bateman represent if the novel didn’t provide this perspective already. But it does: on every single page this culture is mocked in thoughts and dialogue that have little need of physical manifestation. In one scene, Bateman listens to his friends guffaw about how “the only girls with good personalities who are smart or maybe funny or halfway intelligent… are ugly chicks.” He then spoils their fun by referencing someone else who also had a highly reductive view of women: he quotes a serial killer who says he wants to do two things when he sees a pretty girl.

Week 3 Asian Horror

By far one of the weirdest books I have ever read which is not a shocker coming from Kafka. The author tends to pick topics that are strange and very out there. The strange star mark sheep has the ability to take possession of people’s mind in order to control social and political power in the world. What makes the novel so appealing I believe is the authors ability to strike common chords between the modern Japanese and American middle classes within the younger generations. The book has its moments were I question the political system taking places in the locations and the ability and affect it has on the younger generation. While some have called A Wild Sheep Chase a fable or a myth, I would never regard it as such. Murakami uses the surreal to underscore what is wrong with reality. He is very much the critic, and everything he puts in his books is a comment on Japanese society and culture. The namelessness and blandness of many of the characters is part-and-parcel with Murakami's critique on Japanese uniformity and work-a-day lifestyle. Indeed, the protagonist's life prior to the beginning of his adventure is very much a prison--he goes to work, comes home, eats, sleeps, and repeats the process, simply passing time. The pointlessness of his existence demands the reader to ask if the man is simply waiting for death. Instead, Murakami delivers a Campbellian call to adventure, and the hero leaves to discover just how deep the rabbit-hole goes.

Week 2 Vampire

    The book “Interview with a Vampire” starts with the main character Louis the vampire. After conducting a interview with a mortal boy it changes Louis life forever. With twist and turns throughout the novel he faces betrayal amongst his own kind. With a road of immortality ahead of him Louis soon figures out its best to be alone. Louis struggles with feeding off others to survive and wishes that he didn’t have to. He later gets a companion named Lestat. Lestat has a different outlook on life compared to Louis. She wants to explore and enjoy her immortality unlike Louis who usually complains or thinks a negative aspect. Most of the time he reflects on life and only sees the bad when she doesn’t. When Lestat causes issues with Claudia things take a turn for the worst in the book. The drama between the characters goes back and fourth sticking the main four and how they choose to live out there endless lives. Drama, revenge, and loyalty are all main factors in this book. Overall not a book I would read again because of the topic. I was never a fan of vampire novels or the hype that was brought upon by Twilight and many other books. This was one of the better ones that I have read but again lacking in interest made if difficult to read and fully enjoy.

Week 1 - Frankenstein : Mary Shelley

    After reading the book Frankenstein by Mary Shelley Robert Walton's letters to his sister frame the story that Victor Frankenstein tells to Walton, and Frankenstein's story surrounds the story that the monster tells, which in turn frames the story of the De Lacey family. Frankenstein is a gothic novel. Although Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is compelling in and of itself, it also functions on a symbolic level or levels, with Frankenstein's monster standing in for the coming of industrialization to Europe, and the death and destruction that the monster wreaks symbolizing the ruination that Shelley feared industrialization would eventually cause. One of the early parts of the book I can recall to was when the monster has taught himself to read and understand language so that he can follow the lives of his "adopted" family, the De Laceys. While the monster wanders the woods, he comes upon a jacket with a notebook and letters that were lost by Victor. From the notes, the monster learns of his creation. He has endured rejection by mankind, but he has not retaliated upon mankind in general for his misfortune. Instead, he has decided to take revenge on his creator's family to avenge the injury and sorrow he endures from others. Frankenstein's creation was bent on revenge against the creator because of the creators pain and sorrows. In the end Frankenstein dies leaving the reader and myself somewhat sad and it was unsettling. Over all good book never was able to read it in High school glad I had the chance to this time around.