Negative Humor

I follow an account on Instagram that posts (what I think are funny) photos. They usually have pictures with a  funny caption. Some of these pictures would be considered negative humor. Here are a few I found that were negative.

I think the second picture is the worst of all. These are negative humor because they either make fun of someone one at their expense or they stereotype people. The first picture stereotypes white people who get tattoos of random Asian symbols. The second picture makes fun of obese people. The third picture makes fun of red-necks. The fourth picture makes fun of Richard Branson and ugly dogs. I think these are funny despite their negative connotations. I don't think we can necessarily help what we find funny. Most of the posts from this account are not negative like these. These types of jokes come up in our every day lives and mold what we all find funny. 

Being an Adult is HARD!

I have now lived away from my parents for almost two years. When I was at home I never worried about anything close to what I worry about not. I didn't have any bills to pay nor did I worry much about my future. Now, I pay for almost all expenses outside of school and I worry intensely about my future. I have to do my own laundry and no one tells me to clean my room. Finding a place to live next year was a completely new experience for me as was opening a retirement plan. Overall I miss being a child and having everything taken care of for me. However, the experience of transitioning to adulthood has been good for me.

Not only have I learned how to manage my money, but I have also learned time management skills and responsibility. I finally get to be the boss of myself and run my life. Having this freedom is exhilarating and, at the same time, stressful. If I do not get something done, I only have myself to blame. I must be on top of things and find ways to motivate myself to get done what needs to be done.

One of the hardest lessons I have learned in the past two years is that life isn't fair. You won't always get what you want or even what you deserve. There will be times when you try your hardest in a class and still get a C (Organic Chemistry). Often there will be situations when you want something someone who doesn't deserve it gets it instead. The sooner one can come to terms with the fact that life is going to include a lot of suffering, the sooner one can let it go and be happy.

Happiness has always been my goal in life. I don't care about the money, only that I have enough to support myself. I truly want to do something that is meaningful and fulfilling to myself. Finding that thing that is both supporting and fulfilling is hard and even, at times, discouraging. To this day, I do not know what it is I want to do. I am traveling down a path now, but how am I to know if it is the right one or not? The answer to this question, I have learned, is that no one knows. All you can do is follow your heart and pray for the best. In the end, everything tends to work out all right.

I do love my life even in the times when I am brought to tears trying to figure out what my next step should be. What brings me back to a place of peace is taking a deep breath, walking outside, and looking at the world around me. We are so lucky to live in such a beautiful world filled with beautiful people. We are even luckier to live where we do, in safety and comfort. Remembering that I am as lucky as I am to be attending a great university in a great country is usually enough to relieve all the tensions of adulthood that I have poured upon myself.

Zoo Trip

I went to the Fort Worth Zoo with Sruthi with the intention that it would be easy to find people laughing. To our surprise, it was hard to find people laughing and even harder to get it on camera. We ended up feeling really creep and laughing at ourselves more than the people around us were laughing. Honestly Sruthi and I laughed more than anyone around us. We came to the conclusion that we have exceptional senses of humor and we are extraordinarily funny. Here are the videos I was able to capture.

In the great primate facility we found a baby monkey of some kind. All of the children really liked the baby. They were laughing as the baby played on a rope. The monkey was cute and I thought the children commenting on the monkey were funny. 

We were in the great primate facility. As we walked up the the gorillas (I think) we noticed all of the people around the display laughing and taking pictures. One of the animals were bent over doing something on the ground with its hands. It was a view of the animals you usually do not get and everyone was a little surprised by what was going on. The children were all asking what was going on and the adults around laughed even more at their questions.

 These two little girls had obviously had a red lollipop or something along those lines. They were quite proud of their red tongs and their mothers were taking their pictures. I didn't get the mothers laughing in the video, but they were. The girls were also laughing. Sruthi and I caught their laughter. It was funny that they were so proud that they were even showing strangers their tongues. 

Turns out that laughter is contagious. At least it is contagious to me. It was a fun and challenging experience to try to find examples of laughing. 

Conversation Partner #6

Today I went to the Intensive English Program's Social. I didn't know what to expect and all I had hoped for was that there would be food. I found myself in a loud and packed room. I decided the best way to find Lupe was to just yell out her name. Thankfully she responded and we quickly found our way into the food line. There were all kinds of deserts to taste (my favorite were the Dates). Then we sat down to eat and began talking. She told me that she all of the Intensive English students got to have this social instead of having grammar class. Lupe was excited about this because grammar is her least favorite subject. 

After we ate, we noticed a group of students gathering in a circle. We decided to join them and learned they were about to start a game of "Spoons". Spoons is like musical chairs except you use spoons instead of chairs and cards instead of music. The goal of the game is to not be the person who doesn't get the spoon. The first person to pick up a spoon must have 4 cards of the same kind (four 4's or four queens). This game can become intense as one might imagine. Lupe and I sat next to us while we played and decided to play secretly as a team. Whoever grabbed a spoon would grab two spoons so that neither of us would be kicked out of the game. This strategy worked for a while, but once the pool of spoons became smaller it became harder to grab two spoons. On the second to last game, Lupe and I grabbed the same spoon. Our tug-of-war lasted about three seconds until I let go so that Lupe could continue to play. 

The social was more fun than I expected and I enjoyed seeing all of the Intensive English program. I am going to miss Lupe. The experience of having a conversation partner has been not only educational, but also fun. Having made a new friend, I plan to pursue more experiences like this. 

Conversation Partner #5

As usual Lupe and I met in the cafe of the BLUU. We asked eachother about the past week and complained about school as we always do. Then, for some reason, we found little to talk about. I decided to try something new. I am addicted to this app called Triva Crack. It is a trivia game you play against friends on a mobile device. Usually I am not a competitvie person (okay, sometimes I am), but with Trivia Crack I can get really into the game. Sometimes I get a little upset when I get a question wrong or someone beats me in a battle. I am also pretty good at trivia and have a winning record. Turns out Lupe is good at trivia as well. Sometimes I had to explain a word or two to her, but overall she is almost as good as I am.

We played for about 20 minutes. At the end of the game we were tied and we battled for the win. Lupe won! Even though I am competative, I am not a sore looser. Lupe desereved to win and she was quite gracious about her victory. It was fun to play a game instead of talking the entire time. We have continued to play Trvia Crack while apart and Lupe has won almost every time (maybe she is cheating...).

Eddie the Bird Man

I have recently started research with two biology professors and one graduate student. The research is on mercury contamination in the environment. Basically, mercury gets into food chains thorugh water bodies. In lakes, streams, and ponds elemental mercury (Hg0) is converted to toxic methyl mercury by bacteria in the water. Then, small organisms eat the bacteria and slightly larger organisms eat the small organisms, etc. Eventually, the methyl mercury accumulates in invertebrets like dragonflies emerge from the water and become part of the terrestrial food chain. Mercury accumulation causes many problems in animals including the softening of bird eggs (which causes the offspring to die before hatching). So, the research project is collecting the exoskeletons (called exuvia) of damselflies and dragon flies that are shed when the organisms enter their terrestrial lives. These exoskeletons will be counted and any live organisms collected will be tested for mercury content. (This is a basic overview of the experiment).

The professors and graduate stuent that I work with (along with two other undergrad students) are awesome. The graduate student's name is Eddie. Eddie loves birds and is an avid bird watcher, which I now know are called "Birders". From only 3 sessions of visiting the ponds with Eddie I now know more species of birds than I ever thought I would. At first, I thought Eddie's constant lectures on birds and their "interesting" facts would get annoying. I was pleasantly surprised that I began to enjoy learning about birds. He even lets me borrow his (expensive) binoculars to better see the birds. By the third time I went to the ponds I could identify 4 species of birds.

A Great Blue Heron

A Red Winged Blackbird

A Turkey Vulture

A Black Vulture

There is a term biologist use to describe large animals with large personalities: "Charismatic Megafauna". Goats and horses would be charasmatic megafauna because they tend to have personalities that we humans find entertaining. Eddie is a charasmatic megafauna of his own breed. He can go on telling story after story of his biological and birding adventures and each story is as entertaing as the next. In a short amount of time Eddie, and the professors I work with have taught me something valuable. They are all so passionate about the avenue of study they have persued. I have been inspired by these biologists to dive deeper into my passion for biology. I havn't really been passionate about biology until now. Maybe the hands on experience I am having has helped spark a new interest for me. However, I think the people I am working with are the biggest inspiration. I have learned when your work is your passion and your passion is your work, you find true happiness.

I look forward to the next two and a half years with these biologist as they continue to inspire my own passion for the biology around me. I also plan on becoming semi-proficient in the identification of birds thanks to Eddie.

                                                                             Me collecting exuvia from the traps.

A rOAR of Laugher

When our Lit and Civ class went ont he canoe/kayak trip I knew I wanted to kayak. Sruthi, Hannah, and I all got kyaks and we quickly pulled ahead of the rest of the pack (Sruthi in the lead obviously). We often had to wait for the slackers in the canoes to catch up, so to pass the time the three of us decided to serenade the nature around us. As we drifted down the Trinity River, we sang our favorite songs (well, my favorite songs); Disney songs! I know most of the words to most Disney songs, especially from The Little Mermaid and Hercules. The other two were not as fluent in the magical words of Disney as I am. They would start off strong with me and maybe carry through the first chorus, but from there I would take over. At the point when Sruthi and Hannah no longer knew the words, they would then become the instrumental part of the songs. Sruthi is especially good at the instrumentals. We thought our chorus line was hilarious. Whenever one of us did especially well (or not so well), we would break song and laugh for a while. The other two thought it was humorous when I was the only left singing because I was the only one who knew the words.

The song that got us to laugh the most was one from Pocahontas called "Just Around the Riverbend". This song obviously pertained to the activity we were performing and made it feel like we were in the movie with Pocahontas when we sang it. It was funny to us, I believe, because we were sharing the experience of being silly. Most people do not sing while paddling down a river. Surely, the pedestrians on the sidewalk above the river could hear our melodies and that made it even funnier. We didn't care what people thought and it was so much fun! At one point I told the others that they were making one of my lifelong dreams come true; to sing disney songs while floating down a river. They thought it was funny that I would have such a dream and also that were were actually living it out.

I believe in times of true bonding like the one I experienced on the river with Sruthi and Hannah cause you to let go and release laughs. It is a way of showing happiness and playfulness. I can't name many other people who would be game for singing disney songs with me, let alone listen to me sing disney songs. Singing alone wouldn't have been near as fun.

Conversation Partner #4

For our fourth meeting, Lupe and I met in the commons because it was a nice day. We sat on a blanket in the grass and watched the people around us. Once we finished the "Hi! How are you doin?" over with we began to discuss the people around us. We found that we both like to people watch and we were pretty good at it. We watched couples walk by holding hands. Mostly we saw people walking while fiddling with their phones.
After a while, we made a game where we tried to gues what people were talking about. Lupe would be one person and I would be the other. We would perform voice overs for the conversations we saw but could not hear. For the most part we made fun of people and made their conversations more interesting than they probably were. Here is an example of a couple's conversation we voiced over:
Me (The guy): Oh hey girl! Feel my sweater.
Lupe (The girl): Why?
Me: Know what its made of
Lupe: No..
Me: Boyfriend material.
Lupe: Wow... Um... okay

So, pretty much we made our own fun just watching people and pretending they were having funny conversations. There were times when Lupe didn't understand my humor and vise versa. Once we explained the joke to eachother, we began to understand eachother's humor more.

Conversation Partner Meeting #3

Every college student has those weeks when they have two tests, a paper, a project, and some social gathering they must attend. Right? We all have those weeks when we feel like we have no extra time and, even, not enough time at all to get done all that needs to be done. This week was one of those weeks for both I and Lupe. We both had big tests the next day, and we both had other things we could be doing instead of meeting each other to talk. The majority of our conversation centered around complaining about how much school work we had to do, and how stressed out we were. One of us would complain and the other would say, "you're going to do great!" Then the other would say, "NO! I'm seeeeriously going to fail this test." By the end of the conversation, we were both ready to move on and get our studying done. This conversation sparked two interesting concepts to me when I later reflected on it.
The first aspect that sparked my thought concerned the complaining. Why did we both have such deep doubts in our abilities. Both Lupe and I are obviously intelligent enough to make it this far in college. Why do we not have confidence in ourselves? Is it because we don't want to seem conceited and confident in our abilities? Or, is it that we want others to feel bad for all the hard work we have to put in? Furthermore, why do we complain so much about our schoolwork when we should be thankful for how fortunate we are to be going to school? I do not have the answers to theses questions. The only quasi-answer I can think of is that we all like to complain because it is what society has taught us to do.
The second aspect of my conversation with Lupe that interested me was how neither of us were truly "present" to each other. We both longed to be other places doing other things. Instead of enjoying each other's company and sharing the time, we were complaining about things unrelated to the present moment. I notice the distance of people more often as I grow older. Most people are not present to one another and it is a shame. We all have something to give and we all should mindfully recognize what other people deserve: our presence. You never know when someone is in need of you'r attention or when giving your attention to someone else can even help you.
This is all food for thought and just my reflecting on my thoughts and experiences. I hope someone can relate to what I am seeing and maybe make an effort to be present to someone who needs it.