Looking Back At Sunsets On The East Side / We Lost Track Of The Time

So I apologize for not posting last night, but the reasoning will come later.

So this week was about accomplishing things and catching up. I wrapped reading "Fences" by August Wilson, and earlier wrapped reading "Manhunt: the 12 day search for Lincoln's killer", and I plan on writing reviews a bit later. I also was granted access and am now the head designer/web developer for the Carlynton Marching Band. So that's sort of exciting.

I also got to catch up with an old friend of mine, as well as Dave (of Dave 'n Clay show concept fame on here I guess). We took on the world through wooded trails, and Dave screaming "YOLO" for no particular reason.

It was nice to catch up. And anyone that's read Paper Towns by Jayscribble can appreciate this when I say she pulled a Margo and called me about an hour ahead of time, and appeared at my doorstep for an adventure the nature of which neither of us exactly knew.

And I like that. Spontaneity. Nevertheless, we adventured around and talked about where we're going and what we're doing. And it was then that I realized how far I've come, and actually how 'old' we are.

In my mind at least, I was back in eight grade. It was when we got to talking that I realized that I'm now a Junior. It's crazy.

So this Friday (the day I SHOULD have posted, yeah, yesterday) I got another one of those Margo-esque calls but this time it was from Clay. Today when I post this is his birthday (HAPPY BIRTHDAY!), and last night we went on a bowling adventure in an underground lane in Crafton. But first we went to the dollar store in the same plaza.

Dollar stores are curious places, full of deals and the strong smell of plastic. You know the plastic I'm talking about - not the lovelyness of new car, but the stuff that makes you wonder how the nice people working the registers don't get asphyxiated on their shift.

We had no purpose there except to kill time, and it's sort of dangerous to let four teenagers loose in a dollar store. And they had everything there from "LOOKS REAL!" gag ketchup to "Jihad Joe: the novel" to Pokemon tattoos... and 'Hater Shades'.

At least I think that's what they're called. That or shutter shades or something. They were given the dollar store generic name of "party shades" and 3/4 of us got them and I bowled about 1/6 of the time with them on. Now I may have been hallucinating, but I think they helped me line up the shot better. Nevertheless, I still lost.

But ultimately that didn't matter. We were in a half-decent yet deserted bowling alley underneath a grocery store in a shopping plaza I've been to once, having the time of our lives. And yeah, the pizza wasn't that great, but these are definitely the things I will remember about my summers: getting calls randomly from friends and the adventures that follow.

TEDxGrandviewAve, Ideas, Pittsburgh

Okay, so a while back I had read about this TED talk spinoff called TEDxGrandviewAve. For those of you who don't know what the TED talks are, they are essentially a bunch of mini-lectures and talks on "Ideas Worth Spreading", and have been around since 1984ish. The TEDx Talks are kind of like TED talks, only independently organized events. TEDxGrandviewAve is the Pittsburgh version of it.

So I emailed the guy that helps run the Re(imagine) Media program about it. He liked the idea of the group of us coming to watch. Unfortunately, by this point the 100 slots had already filled for the physical event. Thus, the event we would attend would be a webcast party (one of the three official ones) at a place called StartUptown in the Uptown section of Pittsburgh.

Flash-forward to today: I go to StartUptown, and eventually meet up with the Re(imagine)rs and my friend Dave Wovchko at StartUptown. So what exactly is StartUptown? Well, I arrived first and had the chance to talk to Dale, the gentleman who founded StartUptown

"THE VISION is to build a community-connected campus of entrepreneurial activity in the eastern half of the Uptown neighborhood — and to retain companies as they grow upwards of 20-50 employees." -StartUptown.org

The StartUptown Space

So anyway, we visit the space, get a tour, and settle down into the area where we are to watch the TEDx Livestream. However, as with most things, it didn't happen that way.

The Livestream didn't work. The audio didn't match the video, and it kept jerking around. We really could have stopped there, the 10 or so of us who were there. But we didn't. We decided to open up a new window and watch some of the talks from TED.com, the main events.

What happened was interesting. Someone would suggest a video, and we'd watch it. Then something strange would happen - we'd start talking about something related to that video, and talk for a good 20 minutes or so before someone suggests another and it repeats.

So why is this so interesting? Well, the room ranged in age from 15 year old me to 64 year old Dale. These were adults and 20somethings and high schoolers all talking about the world around them, and the ideas that shape that world.

We took some breaks in between there, mainly to meander about the space, and Dave and I collaborated on a logo that may soon be a logo for one of the companies there. They had these door-sized dry erase boards in each of the spaces. I found this fascinating that the whole space was very much a space for creativity, and couldn't help but start sketching on the one.

Nevertheless it brought back into focus what I enjoy - listening to what people have to say, and being able to think and learn with and around other people in a setting that embraces creativity.

I feel like I was a part of something, even though we didn't see what actually happened at TEDxGrandviewAve, we learned about something. Something bigger than ourselves in a learning community.

And I think in a broader sense that's where everyone learns- not in the same age clumps, or in specialized hallways or whatever, but by interacting and creating with other people AND with yourself.

Super Special Bonus Blog Post Fun Time!

Do I ever use my own pics?
SOURCE: OrthodoxCarnegie.org

So yesterday I was texting my sister (No, not my real sister, but you get the idea... [maybe this is what Jay Scribble means by "Secret Sister" and "Secret Brother"]) and she invited me to church. Granted, I can go to church down the hill anytime I want, but I got invited, so I decided to come...

So this morning I woke up and walked down the hill, over a block or so, down the hill some more, and eventually made my way to Mansfield Boulevard where the church is. I walked into the church, greeted the greeters (Its a bizarre feeling to be formally 'greeted') and then got the reader(My not-real sister's father)'s permission as well as the priest's permission to serve (I'm an alter server, not a priest, or deacon, or bishop, or anything else).

It has been a long time since I have served solo with another priest; and it was, to say the least, interesting. It isn't, at least in my eyes, my "home" parish. That title goes to Slickville, and will forever be Slickville. But it was nice to be able to experience church through the customs of my geographic home parish.

On a side note, the priest was absolutely amazed I walked the five or so blocks to church.
"If your dad and brother are in Slickville, and your mom is in Butler, how did you get here?"
"Um, I walked"
"Woah. Oh, thanks for coming"

Anyway, I stayed for the Parastas, and then attended Sunday for the first time in about seven or eight years. Again, it was a tad taboo for me to go into a church basement, sit with people my age, and discuss what had just happened upstairs. I won't go into too much detail (Feel free to ask, I just am not trying to be a blogevangelist), but it was bizarre to me, or at least foreign. Slickville has an average age of about 75, making my brother and I the youngest "members" of the church (legally and canonically, we can't be members, but again, I am not going to go into detail). Our Sunday School was my mother brother and I talking in the basement of the church about the miracles of Christ, as well as what the parts of the liturgy meant, et cetera. It was very much the same in the content respect, only it wasn't two small children and their mother talking one-on-one.

We later went next door to the hall, where I talked for a while with people I hadn't seen in a while, greeted other people, and then my sister's mother gave the two of us a ride to musical practice.

I am not at liberty to discuss the specifics of the show (See it at Carlynton live April 19-22nd) but basically, we took pictures, sang a little, attempted to dance (Or rather, I attempted to dance whilst the people around me actually danced), and then went home.

Yay, this is something I actually own!

"Going home" was staying at my house for about an hour, and then descending the hill I already had walked this morning to the basement of another church for a boy scout meeting. We discussed upcoming events, and then had some team-building stuff that we went over as well as chain of command.

According to my friend, the girl scouts are a classroom-oriented organization. You are sorted by age group and have one year or so to accomplish a rank. The boy scouts is quite the opposite. You gain a rank by earning it with your own initiative (You can be in the program for six or seven years and be a tenderfoot... we don't encourage it, but you can do it). We are very much boy-led, and its kind of amazing how it all is brought together.

I finished my Sunday by texting my sister and the before-mentioned friend and coming up with a blog post idea. I decided I was going to talk about my Sunday. I texted my sister a name, and that was "Super Special Bonus Blog Post Fun Time!" And she liked it.

PS: Why is Blogger telling me Slickville is not a word... or texting?

#Hashtagging, Texting, and Explaining JayScribble

So I was watching NCIS on CBS (No, they don't pay me to say it, its just what is always on at my house for some reason...) and in the bottom left I saw during like the first two minutes of the show "#NCIS" which to anyone who is unfamiliar with the internet or Twittering (Tweeting? Tweetering?) doesn't know what this means.

Anyway, about Julyish my friend Dave introduced me to this idea of kind of "Tagging" things in facebook, twitter, etc. posts. The idea was, you place a Pound Sign (#) before whatever you wanted to tag the post with, and then people could search the tag and see how many other people had the same tag.

Here a few months ago, I find that I was only a small part of this idea, and that it's on Twitter (Yeah, I'm on twitter, feel free to follow me @AlexPopichak). I also found out that if you go to the web version of twitter, you can click on a hashtag and it'll take you to a thing where you see the Hashtag's search page. I don't think there's anything yet for #The2015Blogger. Hmm...

So on an unrelated note, I have been texting like crazy for the past few weeks. I have found that I am quite good at texting, albeit almost never in a timely manner. It helps a lot that I have a keyboard cellphone, though.

Anyway, my teacher claimed that text communication and internet communication are a step backward as far as communication goes. I have to say I disagree with that. At first we only had talking. The only way to reach someone was to think of something, then form it with your mouth, and then hope they interpret what you really mean. Then we had this thing called writing, with the same aim, only using physical characters instead of words. This made it easier to get a point across, because you didn't need to rely on the telephone (the game, not the instrument) method or be everywhere at once. Now we have texting.

In my opinion, texting is the closest thing we can get to telepathy. It combines the ideas of writing with the words coming straight from the mind. I might be going out on a limb, but I believe I have some form of a point here.

So the next best thing to telepathy or actually being in a place in person (and I hope you'll agree with me on this one) is appearing via video. Jay Scribble and his brother do this once a week.

Anyway, JayScribble did this series in his Vlogbrothers videos back in 2010 regarding the French Revolution. I enjoyed it personally (although he talks really fast) because it got all of the information in your head in a memorable way with visual aid.

So we were studying the French Revolution in class, and I asked my teacher (She prefaced class with "we're watching a video today") if she was talking about some dry half-hour video with a video sheet. She was. So I introduced her to JayScribble and his French Revolution series. I just asked her to take a look at it.

My American Cultures teacher prefaced her class the following day with "We're watching a video series today that Alex found." And then for the next half hour we covered the entire French Revolution a la John Green. At the end of the series she made the comment that she feels that she talks REALLY SLOW in comparison to JayScribble.

I find it ironic that about a month before that, he had created a World History series on a separate channel. You can check that out online at YouTube.com/CrashCourse.

On Minecraft, and Musicals, and Daytime Television

First off, I decided to write a blog about Pop Culture. I am not 100% sure as to why, but here goes nothing.

I am not a fan of television anymore. I drew the line at NCIS never-ending reruns on USA network. I got fed up and went straight for the internet. Honestly, the internet is a television that you choose your own content (Youtube) and Channels (Also Youtube) and can interact with them. However, sometimes my parents think I am too involved with internet, and force me back into reality. Rule of thumb is that if its dark outside, I'm either on my computer, sleeping, or otherwise doing something of that nature. This leaves me to only be watching occasional daytime television.

Daytime television is really the shows that could never make it primetime, or have too involved a plot for the night dwellers. These shows are what we call "soap operas." These are the most pointless bits of professional production that I have come across so far. And there are MAGAZINES for this stuff! Not only do they assert their pointlessness after the noon news, they also have to invade the stands around where people check out with their bread and milk.

This is a Creeper ^ He says hi
(Source:thinkgeek.com)

Moving right along, one of the most happening thing on the internet and gaming world is something called "Minecraft."  Its this magical little game where one's objective is, well, whatever he/she wishes. I have taken a liking to mooching off of my friend Clay's computer and building this insanely huge railroad thingy (yeah, creative mode, I am just that awesome) that defies gravity and runs into itself and stuff. Otherwise, I don't care too much for building houses with the little blocks and whatnot. I don't particularly understand the fascination of it, but I will keep plugging along at Clay's house with the magical railroad.

I have debated at great lengths as to whether or not to actually get this game for myself. I don't have the time really.

Speaking of not having much time, I am about to audition for a musical. This brings up two things: my lack of dancing skills, and the return to a stage. I haven't been on a stage in front of a crowd performing for about three years. The second isn't much of an issue because I enjoy the stage for no apparent reason. Take for example anchoring the TV announcements when they needed a fill in on Thursday. I enjoyed it being alongside co-anchor DavidWov and Host Clay Bodnar. But back to the first issue. I am concerned that not being able to dance might play a factor in auditions. However, as my chorus director told me - You're a guy, they won't expect too much. Find a girl and have her help you.

Well, that presents a whole other problem with "finding a girl", but not one involving a musical.

Post-Blog: I believe that I have developed a style of writing here. I title a three-topic blog and add a picture of something semi-related and then write some semi-depressing note before a closing that looks semi-optimistic. You like?

I Can't Believe I Have Never Blogged About Canada!

So I decided to reblog some random blog post from here, just to generate traffic to this site, and to show what I do in my spare time. [For the record this is for my tumblr]

In order to decide what to reblog, I plugged the word "Canada" into my sidebar search thing-a-ma-jig. Amazingly, that word has never appeared in my blog before. I don't hate you Canadians, its just that you occasionally slip my mind! So, here goes nothing (really):

Canadian Please
So recently I discovered a Canadian vlogger through watching Elmify on Youtube religiously. Anyway, he posted a music video about how basically Canadians are awesome. You should really go check it out if you get a chance, as well as my other Favourites on Youtube.

We're Going to Canada (in 2016)!!!
This past year, I talked to my friends about going to Canada just as a trip when we were all 19. The plan was to go to Toronto, and have fun in Canada. The only two issues came up with transportation. The first is a small expense called a Passport and the other being a vessel to hold eight people. So basically, a school bus, or maybe just two cars. Another idea was a subway boring straight to Toronto. How we'll surface? Heck if I know.

TRANSITION!

Finally, I am working on some new projects... but those won't be out for a while. I am going to post next about maybe Elmify, Meekakitty, Vlogbrothers, or someone else. Wanna suggest something? Comment or email me at the link under "contact webmaster" or whatever I put at the bottom.

Two Thousand Bloody Views and LapsingReality(CC)

So apparently [as far as all time views go] this website is more popular than my built-from-scratch troop site. Unfortunately, I've been working on analytics with this longer than the troop site. ENOUGH NERD TALKING!

So recently I have been focusing on television and off-the-internet projects (such as Bulletin Board Events) instead of my regular YouTube videos. However, the past two weeks have been quite the opposite.

On Saturday, my friend Clay (BBC Project, JSVH, Total Randomness) decided we should go up to the park. As always, I brought my HD camcorder. That is when the idea for LapsingReality came to us. We decided to take everyday things and speed them up.  [See Bottom Of This Post]

Finally, I filmed a collab video on August 4th. Due to things near my control, I am not posting that yet. Also in the works is a Total Randomness 4. Wow, four already.
 

Lapsing Reality:Park

#TheBabyIsMakingOctopusSounds and A Little Bit Of OCD

Okay, first off, I would like to say this is post 94. For post 100 (If I can last that long) I will probably make a vlog. It will be unsuccessful, but it will be here nevertheless. It is kind of a long-running thing with me. First the journalism, then websites, then videos, and now into this mode of not really caring where things go anymore.

So, I attended my first "End Of The Year" Party. It basically was this: going to a friends house, swimming, listening to music, beating each other with plastic things, and then watching a terrible old movie. Honestly, what better do we have to do on a Thursday in June? This party was attended by all of my creative friends (DavidWov, Mistaecco, Clay!), (Minus Youtube's MrXigbar22) and we talked about a little bit of everything. That is where the "#TheBabyIsMakingOctopusSounds" tag came from. It was really a combination of two ideas: hashtagging, and naming folders.

On an almost unrelated note, I have been scrolling the YouTubes Lately with the obsessive VlogBrothering thing and I have also discovered "Elmify". She is a person from a place that is mildly entertaining. She rants about stuff in a way that is slightly boring yet entertaining at the same time. Well, I will be back eventually.
Yours,
Alex.
PS: I shouldn't sign blog posts.

Polio, CarLynTon, Halloween, and other stuff

Please note: this post will be written over a period of time!

I'd like to thank all of you for your continued support with everything. My blog is a mishmash of me ranting abou everyday things. My next question: Why must High School come with some much drama?

I was recently approached by my pretty good friend about a video contest. It is concerning Polio, and how it affected life as we know it. I am going into this as my first real video project. I am going to start over. That DnC Show was a great concept, the JSVH a great temporary success, and Total Randomness: COME ON! I only have so many blooper reels. So, with my good friend, I am going into this. I prefer not to talk about it, but I can give only some information. However, I am going to have people with music, stories, and a not-so-professional writer!

Halloween. One of my least favorite holidays. Sure, I put on that whole, "I love Halloween" act. Honestly, it is the one day out of the year where people are given an excuse to act something that they aren't. So, you are telling me that you want to portray SNOOKIE or something like FREDDY CROUTON! Anyway, people, myself included, act like something that they are not all of the time. I can quite frankly be schizophrenic... angry at one point, and break down laughing the next.

CarLynTon: a story of how things became what they are today. My next great project, and the one that may have any potential this year. Yes, I contemplated going onto the "BBC 2 1/2 Forever" mode, but that is just illogical. Much like Disney, I can only hold onto an audience for long. Well, more details to come.

Post # 47...

So, yes this is post #47, fast approaching 50. Anyway, every time I post something here, it goes to my Gmail's Google Buzz thing. If you follow me (stalkers) you will get these updates. It's kinda like, Twitter for Google. anyway, back to what I really wanted to talk about.
When someone is writing a book, or in my case a blog, the question is how to introduce a character. There are many ways to go about this. One would be just flat out describing them. Another would be to describe their personality. Then there is one of my favorites: introduce them in conversation, having the reader guess what the heck you are talking about. I can only look at one of my own posts to see what I do.
So I go over this list of things I want to talk about in my next blog post. I can't bore people with stories of how Dave asks about the wiki. Neither can I talk about how I wish to have a domain name but are too cheap to get one. I can't talk about how I lose a math paper in a copying machine, having to re-do it, and then having my brother pull it out of the copy machine the second that I finish re-doing it. Bottom line, I have a rather anticlimactic and boring life. I have thousands of stupid stories like these, and you'd think I would share them on a place like this, but I don't. So, I need to go back to doing basically nothing that is worth mentioning, i.e. work on a website, or work on the Troop Communications system. I plan on writing my own program to solve the world's computer problems. Until then, that's life.

So... What have you been up to?

It seems that I completely forget I even have this website, but then at about the time I am editing That Dave n' Clay show's blog, I remember. Anyway, back to the stories
It is amazing what you can talk to the person that is cutting your hair about. On Saturday, I decided that I would just sit and think while the lady is cutting my hair. Next thing I know, I am talking about the school year so far and what is going on in my world. To be honest, there is a lot going on. Dave is trying to do a "We are the World" video with 7th and 8th graders. So far, we have me, Dave, Clay, and a gilr named Raphael. I have known Raphael since 4th grade, but it wasn't until this year that I really got to know her. She knows about the blog, and knows Dave. On Google Chat (Awesome by the way) Dave thought that Raphael would not agree to this, I thought otherwise, I was right. So we have a girl singing in the group, it's a start. So the total people # is about six. I don't know if it will work out, but if it does, it will be fun.
Speaking of Dave, he has been working non-stop on the wiki, and has been contacting me just as much about it, so I have a lot to do with.
I guess that is it, and I have to go anyway. Thanks for reading, Alex

So By The Way...

OK, so I haven't dropped completely off the earth, but I certainly feel like it. For some odd reason, we had a pep rally. So we are huddled together, the entire JR high, on the bleachers of this auxiliary gym above the locker rooms. I sit like this:
------BBBIIIGGGG SPACE-----Andrew  Clay   Alex   Lindsey
Then J'Quay shoves himself next to Lindsey, so we attempt to move down. Andrew refuses to move. Then Dave showed up he attempts to sit next to me:
------BBBIIIGGGG SPACE-----Andrew ClayAlexDaveLindseyJ'Quay SPACE
So Dave, being a gentleman, offered to move poor squished Lindsey down a row, so I was squished between Clay and Dave in a room where I didn't know why I was in it. Next thing I knew, the assembly was over.
The even better part to all of this is that the teachers didn't even know about this until the end of first period. Honestly, I kind of enjoyed the shortened classes. That was my Tuesday.
FYI this is the 45th post since I have began, obviously I did something right.

Hello World

Ok, so this is a general first post title. Now, this website has had way more than that of a brand-new blog. However, I would like to welcome a new panelist officially. This new panelist is David Wovchko.
Dave Wovchko has a Google account, and also blogs. This his personal bio from his Google account:

I am David Wov. I love pictures (photography), Movies (Videography), and Songs (Discography) and producing all three. I am currently making short "movies" or videos with my friend Aidan (AHEM, you're working with ME too). We film using my Flip Ultra camera. We edit using the latest version of iMovie. I am mightily interested with Apple Macintosh products, such as their LED display screen, the iPod Touch (third generation), etc.

So that's Dave. He should be a good addition to this site. Also, I am getting back to my video-producing self.  I went to the cub-scout pinewood derby and filmed a bit. This will be my first video that is produced using Wax 2.0e. I will also be using new graphics. So that's what I'm doing. After all, this is my story and I'm sticking to it.

So I Was Talking to Dave and Clay Today...

It is always interesting when this happens. But really, I should start from the beginning. So I go to lunch and invite Dave to come to our table. Little did I know that having someone to come over to visit for one day would be an international incident. Next thing I know, some lunch aide is interrogating us about "are you a troublemaking group?" and then she introduced us to Dave as if we didn't already know him. After that fiasco, we were free to talk. Together, (Clay, Dave, and I) came up with website ideas. We are working on a project that will be interesting and it will be good. After what happened with Jeff's project, I'm not taking any chances.
On a lighter note, I would like to point out that this is my 45th post. With this I am inviting some of the people in my inner circle to post here along with me. The internet is too big for just one person per website.

The Chronicles of Jr High: The Marine, Gym Class, and some Randomness

But First, here's the weekly comic for "Bad Pun Wednesday" please submit ideas here: 2015 blogger Comic Strip

The Chronicles of Jr High: The Marine, Gym Class, and some Randomness

So as the week progresses, the teachers each want a bit more and add a bit more to the curriculum, as expected.
Each teacher adds a little bit of homework/studying. So, with six real periods, and each teacher adds a bit, you end up with a lot of homework, or notebooks (Depending on the teacher.)

In Gym Class, we thought that Tuesdays were play days, and Thursdays were wrong, or at least thats what we were told. We were wrong. On Tuesday, we had the wonderful "Beep Test." This not only illustrates how out of shape some people are, it also accents the poor acoustics in the gym PA system. Some lady comes on and says, ready set, BEEP!!!!. Then it plays music to pass the time. This music gets annoying after the sixteenth time. That's Surviving Jr High Gym in a nutshell.

Back on the second or third day of school, a good friend of mine wore a T-shirt titled "The Communist Party". It had soviets in party hats and lampshades on their heads, the true meaning of a bad pun. So, Our Marine World Cultures teacher said, "I battled those [People] for thirty years, and it pains me to see shirts like that." He was just joking, but to those reading this he probably sounded serious. Now on the eleventh day of school, he wore the same shirt in honor of "Bad Pun Wednesday." In eight period, Our Marine said this: "I battled those [people] for thirty years, so whats with the shirt, seriously?" He got a laugh out of that one. A funny marine, who knew, well now you know.