#strawfedoras

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[strawfedoras]

"Reality" Television

Blake here. I just moved back in with my parents for the summer while I find a job (post-grad life). Upon arriving at my house I find myself maneuvering my car around a swarm of TV vans and camera crews. "What's this?" I ask myself, certain that an answer will be readily available to me within moments. What I apparently ran into was my next-door neighbors being filmed for the "reality" television show they are going to star in.

The show is called "Dance Moms." Why anybody would watch this kind of garbage is beyond me, but apparently it has enough viewers to be moving into its 3rd season (somebody tell me how Firefly wasn't this popular!). Anywho, I decided to perch outside and watch as the filming began. The crew arrived on my block at 4pm. It is now 6pm and nothing has been filmed. The last 2 hours have been devoted to setting up the shots, lighting, and fake plot devices that they want to see in this episode. Filming will probably get started after sundown.

In my opinion, being allowed to call this program (and the many many others like it) "REALITY" should be illegal. The only thing real about this show is that it's a real waste of time and money. Don't get me wrong, I've known "reality" television was B.S. for a long time now. Nothing bothers me more than watching my roommates go apeshit over a scene in Breaking Amish or The Real Housewives of Whogivesacrap. It's just that I've never been witness to just how fake it really is.

If you stoop so low as to find entertainment from these shows, then I suggest you pick up a new hobby... perhaps russian roulette. It's shows like this that ruin society and it's the viewers that keep them running. STOP WATCHING "REALITY" TELEVISION.

Yours truly,

Blake

[strawfedoras]

Bad Social Media Use

Those who know me well know that I am addicted to social media. No wonder I became a communications major in college and my work experience is in social media, amongst other things. And while I have learned that social media can be used to help a business get to the next level, recent experience has showed it can do the same in damage. I may not be an expert but if I have learned anything truly helpful about social media it is this: if your content isn't organic or at least set to a schedule then don't post it. I say this because some startups or social media newbies put too much into their social media presence. This then makes their content more annoying and feeble than anything. Regardless of how big social media is, offline interactions will always be more important than online. If you don't have it offline then don't act like you do online. -straw fedoras

[strawfedoras]

Wait... Who's a Postgrad?

Graduating a semester early and living in a house full of juniors and engineers that are staying for extra semesters has created the perfect storm to shine a light on the fact that I am no longer a college student. You'd think I'd have already realized this. But when most of the conversations in my house revolve around college classes, parties, or greek life, it's not always easy to think about life after college. Even the other postgrads I spend most of my time with talk about doing undergrad over. Not because they regret something but because it was that much fun.

And it was fun. It was the most fun I have had up to this point in my life. And I dont think I would trade my undergrad experience for another. A friend lost his two front teeth, I was able to live in the party house and see freshmen lose their innocence, and I still managed to graduate. So no regrets right?

Yea I may never be able to throw another toga party or black light party in my living room. I may not have a shitty homemade bar in my house. And chances are I won't be able to go on any more spur of the moment road trips all the time. 

But one of the few things that give me hope that the next chapter of my life will also be mind blowingly awesome is that when I was a freshmen in college I was talking about high school like this. Sure I was excited to be in college but I still missed high school. And now four years after that I can barely recall a singular day from high school. Hopefully I remember most of college. But at least I know there's still a lot to come.

- straw fedoras

[strawfedoras]

The Perfect Ending

One of my favorite movies that many people don't even think of is Secret Window featuring Johnny Depp. Its a great movie and Depp is amazing as usual. But what got me to love it was the same thing that got me to love writing, regardless of how good or terrible I am at it. This idea of being able to create the perfect ending. We all dream of having this ability in real life. To be able to wake up the next day in their dream bed and next to their dream spouse. 

And I am not trying to look past all the hard work that people put into creating perfect endings within their own lives. Most of the time the journey is much more exciting and worthwhile then the ending anyway. And the obvious difference between the perfect ending in writing and it in real life is that in real life you have to wait to get there, while in writing you might already have that perfect ending in your head. Or you may be like Johnny Depp and you're going crazy trying to formulate the perfect ending. 

We all must remember we can't just write a perfect ending for ourselves, even if you are like me and hope that writing leads you to your perfect ending. Instead we must learn from the multitude of imperfect endings that happen to all the short storys in our lives. We must step back and look at the big picture and realize that there is so much more writing to be had. 

-straw fedoras

[strawfedoras]

Word Problems

If a college student gets on a train traveling 60mph North at 6:35pm, and another college student of the opposite sex (or same sex, we don't discriminate) gets on the same train... how long will it take them to realize word problems aren't easy to write? The exercise you just partook in is a real life example of how confused I am about one thing: Life I feel like I speak for all of the graduating class of 2013 when I say, "HOLYSHIT, INEEDHELPANDDONTKNOWWHATTODO!" (Also, if you can read that you deserve a metal). There isn't a moment of my short life that I can remember that I wasn't enrolled in some sort of formal education. And now, right when I'm getting good at it, they toss me out, give me a piece of paper, and send me into the real world!? I'm not prepared for this one bit. Where am I going to live when my lease expires? What if I don't get a good job? What if I don't get any job? How do I meet new friends if I move to a new city? How do I meet girls if office romance is a no-no? These are all questions that I don't have the answers to. A wise man once told me, "[Allstate], it's not what you know it's who you know." That always gave me comfort because it took the pressure off of me to know things. All I had to do to be a success was know people... I could do that. Well that person who gave me that advice was wrong. I want to know things. No, I need to know things! I need to know where I should move. I need to know where to look for jobs. I need to know  And the worst part about it all, I need to know it soon. Time is running out. At this rate, I'll either be homeless or live with my parents (I'd prefer the former). I don't have all the answers to life. I may pretend I do. I may have gotten by perfectly fine until now without them, but it would do me a lot of good if I could just figure out just a few more of them. I clearly need a little more help. After all, I can't even write a good word problem. You're in good hands, <- questionable Allstate

[strawfedoras]

Ye Who Have Little Faith

Yesterday, Batman put me on a diet. Until that moment, I ate whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted, in whatever frequency I wanted; my metabolism always sorted out the rest. Unfortunately, as we get older, our metabolisms start DGAFing as much as we do.... and things needed to change. So I started my diet. Sure, I'm only two days in, but so far so good. I eat healthy food, in healthy portions (not too big, not too small), frequently throughout the day. I'm sitting with my roommates telling them about my diet and the first thing they tell me is, "That's not going to work." "You're going to break." "That's not healthy." The strange thing though, I hadn't even told them what my diet was yet. I just said I was eating healthier and eating less. One roommate insisted that I just needed portion control. The other told me, "Allstate, if you want to eat less, just drink water when you get hungry. After 30 minutes, if you're still hungry, eat a piece of fruit. Then, if you're still hungry, eat food." (If you knew this roommate's diet, you would not take advice from her). And on it went. For 15 minutes my roommates told me that my diet wasn't going to work, then I told them about my diet. In the morning, I can eat any combination of fruit/yogurt and granola/cereal. Then, I take snacks with me for the day. My snacks consist of trail mix, bananas, tangerines, and greek yogurt (again, any combination). For lunch, if I please, I can have a salad, which I discovered today can basically have whatever I want on it as long as I keep the portions reasonable. I continue to munch on the snacks every few hours or so until dinner. For dinner, I can make vegetable stir fry, brown rice and protein (chicken, turkey, beef... whatever). Thanks to my extensive spice drawer, the limits to what I can make for dinner hardly exist. Before I go to bed, if I'm still a little hungry, I can always have one of my snacks. Do I think my diet needs work? Maybe a little. Am I proud that I've even made it two days? Maybe a little. Do I plan on keeping with it and staying healthy? You're damn right I am! So for ye who have little faith, mind your own business. You're in good hands, Allstate

[strawfedoras]

What to Expect When You're Not Expecting

Have you ever heard the phrase "Expect the unexpected" ? Of course you have. We here at straw fedoras know it all too well. Now, I could sit here and mope about the inherent paradox in that cliché, but instead I'm going to talk about how you really should expect the unexpected. Nothing sucks more than the unexpected. Just last week I was riding my bike and my sweat-shirt got caught in the front spokes. Almost immediately, the front tire stopped and I went over the handlebars and broke my elbow. Was I expecting that to happen? No. But if I had expected it, I wouldn't have a broken elbow now, would I? Another saying you've probably heard before, "This couldn't get any worse." Yeah, that's what I was thinking. When people utter that sentence, we all know what is going to happen (it's all part of expecting the unexpected); it's going to get worse. Three days later, I found out I (and many others) were being kicked out of our fraternity. Seriously though, I wasn't expecting that... Life is full of mysteries, but those mysteries can be solved by understanding that life is also full of patterns. Statistically speaking, people who ride bikes are more likely to get into biking accidents than those who do not (I made that up, but it seems pretty true). If I had expected to be in an accident, I would have been able to better prevent it. Also, people tend to see fraternity guys as meat-headed psychopaths, hell-bent on hazing and getting drunk. This means that people are always looking for any chance they can get to jump out from behind a bush and say, "HA! I told you so!" like a little five year old. Should have seen that one coming. Once you learn to expect the unexpected, it is no longer unexpected. That's the beauty behind that statement. You can train yourself to be aware of your surroundings. Now, I must admit, maybe I'm not the best person to be giving this advice. After all, I'm the one with the broken elbow and no Greek affiliation. Still, I implore you to think things through once in a while. If you can see life's simple patterns and act accordingly, I have no doubt that you will be able to expect the unexpected. You're in good hands, Allstate