1000 Awesome Things!

1000 Awesome Things is a genius website.  The concept is wonderfully simple, yet entertaining for hours on end.  It's a blog about completely random things in life that can make you happy.  Yesterday's featured article was #302 'Grandma Hair.'  You know, the perfectly coiffed white (or grey) fluff that everyone's grandmother has?  It was an article dedicated to just that.  And then this morning, it was #300, Successfully Navigating Your Home in the Dark.  I am an epic home navigator, so I really loved reading about this one.

This is not my grandma.

The original list of 1000 is not yet complete, but it has all been archived, so you can read them all in numerical order if you ever have hours upon hours of free time.  They range from actually useful things (#386  Double Spacing Your Essay So That It Takes Up Way More Space) to totally random (#710 When Little Babies Let Out Adult-Sized Burps), but each one get a chuckle out of me.  They are each written in a style that is very relaxed, almost like you are in a conversation with the author.  And the best part is that there are still 300 Awesome Things left to be written!  A new entry is written every weekend (sorry Saturday and Sunday, I guess you're just not special enough to get your own entries), so we've still got around a year's worth of Awesome Things to look forward too.

The author has also taken it upon himself to write books of awesome things, so if you really get into the website, go ahead and buy his books.  I have not bought them, but I am definitely thinking about doing so.  The website is awesome, so I would think that the books would be just as, if not even more, awesome.

A Worthy Cause

I have a slight obsession with jewelry.  Not big, flashy stuff with pearl and bling and whatnot, but like string bracelets and rings.  At the moment, I've got 2 bracelets on my left wrist, 3 on my right wrist, a ring on my right hand, and an anklet on my left foot.  I'll give you a little back story to each of these.  My left wrist is home to a braided leather bracelet that I bought in a flea market in France and what is basically a really long string wrapped around my wrist probably 10 or 15 times.  My ring is a silver Claddagh bought by my best friend in Ireland.  On my right wrist I've got a crab-shaped Silly Band (and I'm not ashamed to admit that) two Brazilets and 46664 Bangle.

Never heard of Brazilets before, have you?  Well allow me to educate you.  They originated in the Bahia region of Brazil (hence the name) and are believed to bring good luck to the wearer.  The bracelet must be tied in three knots, one for each wish you make, and you must allow it to degrade naturally.  Once it falls off of your wrist, your wishes are said to come true.  I have had mine since last May and they are still in relatively good condition, and my mom still has her originals from the summer of 2006.  The proceeds from these bracelets go to Plant A Billion Trees, an organization that replants trees in the Brazilian Rainforest.

My other bracelet that you probably haven't heard of is the 46664 Bangle.  That number may or may not ring a bell in any of your minds, but it's significance is that it was Nelson Mandela's number while he was imprisoned in South Africa from 1964 to 1990.  The proceeds from this bracelet go towards the 46664 Foundation, which Mandela founded to raise awareness for HIV and AIDS.

If you couldn't tell, I'm a sucker for products which benefit different organizations and causes.  If something says that it helps cure cancer or aid people in poverty in Guatemala, I will more than likely buy their product over something different.  I like to think that my purchase makes a difference, even if it is small.   I know that I can't save the world, but if I know that Ican make at least one person's life a little better, I will do all that I can to help them, even if it is something as small as buying a little bracelet. 

The Holy Grail of the Internet

Marvin, this post is dedicated to you.

StumbleUpon is, without a doubt, my absolute favorite website in the entirety of the World Wide Web.  Major snaps to whomever was ingenious enough to invent it.  What it is, is a website that directs you to other websites.  A simple enough concept with AMAZING results.

So basically what you do is go to StumbleUpon and check all of the little boxes that you like (mine include humor, rugby, scuba diving, travel, Australia, and bizarre/oddities, to name a few).  Then you click that yellow stumble button, sit back, and allow yourself to be entertained.  StumbleUpon always manages to bring up just what I am in the mood for, and receives a hearty dose of laughter in return.  How StumbleUpon manages this, I care not, all I know is that it's magic.

I have found a lot of what my future posts will be about on StumbleUpon (how do you think I came across FOUND?), and am on it probably everyday.  The one drawback:  it takes over my life.  While I am not up to the 55,000 Stumbles that my friend Ben has, I do waste way too much time on it when I should be reading our textbook, for example. (Not that I don't read our textbook, because I do.)  Nonetheless, if left unchecked, most people will fall victim to what I like to call SUDD (Stumble Upon Dependence Disorder).  Even while I write this entry, I am finding myself being lured away. Yep, just spent a good twenty minutes right there Stumbling.  Whoops.  It's strangely seductive.  I know many a person who has stayed up all night because during the prime studying hours of 8PM-11PM, they Stumbled instead of being a good student and getting all of their work done.  

In the words of my lovely roommate, Sam Mitchell, "StumbleUpon has broadened my internet experiences, and I am a better person for it.  It is a great procrastination tool."  So, please do yourself a favor, and Stumble every once in a while.

Lost and FOUND

FOUND Magazine was started by two dudes who randomly found a note stuck on their windshield.  They found it interesting, and then started asking their friends if they had ever found miscellaneous notes, lists, or pictures, and began a collection.  This collection was first published in a series of books, and then made it's way into a website.  The website includes not only the original found items, but people are encouraged to post things that they have found as well.

The original FOUND.

I love this website for many reasons.  First of all, it comes up on my StumbleUpon all the time, so I see it pretty regularly.  I also love it because of the posts which people find.  Some are funny, some are nonsensical, and some are very poignant.  My favorite in probably the original item of FOUND, and note accidentally stuck on the founder's windshield.  The note (pictured on right) is wonderful.  After ripping this guy, Mario, to shreds by accusing him of cheating on her, Amber turns right around and asks him to page her?  It is the epitome of relationships in the real world.  The fact that this note never made it into Mario's hands could have been crisis averted, or have just made Amber and Mario's relationship more convoluted.  (and seeing as she put in under the wrong car's windshield, which must have looked like Mario's car, was he ever a cheater in the first place?)  But the beauty of the situation is that we will never know.  I love to think of different situations of how the affects of these notes could have played out.  Are Mario and Amber still together?  Is he actually a scumbag cheater?  Is Amber just paranoid?  Who knows.

Not all of the notes are as dramatic as Amber's.  Just the other day I saw one from a young boy, Trevor, asking a girl, Molly, to be his valentine.  Others have been old family portraits from the early 1900's, and some are ads for a lost dog or pogo stick.  Each post always makes me wonder about the people who made them.  Did Molly accept Trevor's proposal?  Who are the people in the photo?  Was the dog/ pogo stick ever found?  I'll never know the answer to those questions, but I'll never stop asking.