Such meaningless shit!

A fellow aikidoka earlier posted the song American Soldier - Toby Keith on Facebook.

Beside my Brothers and my Sisters I will proudly take a stand

When liberty's in jeopardy I'll always do what's right.
I'm out here on the front lines, sleep in peace tonight.

Beautiful words, but I can't find anything right with this war! American young boys is sent to a war that seem like it will never end! Not just American, but soldiers from all over the world. they die for no reason, and as far as I know, there is not end to this.

Of course terrorism should not exist, but is the best thing really to send out young men?

Most of them (I don't say all as I guess there is probably someone who loves this, but not all), would probably rather stay home with their families rather than fight this meaningless war, as it has came to be.

George W. Bush started it 9 years ago, and there is still no end, and I really hope Obama will succeed better, and that soon.

And I can't call in sick on Mondays when the weekend's been too strong,
I just work straight through the holidays,
And sometimes all night long.

Think of that the next time your work feel like crap, some has it so much worse than you, and not because they themselves have gotten themselves into it, but they do it for you, for your liberty. For the freedom that the whole western world say they stand for.

I'm just trying to be a father,
Raise a daughter and a son,
Be a lover to their mother,

And these are the people who does it, no different from you or me or anyone else. There are families all over the world, not knowing whether their fathers, husbands, sons (or wifes, mothers, daughters for that case) will be coming home alive, or even at all.

Put life in a whole new perspective huh?

Interesting essay

So, this last essay on the "Language and Culture" bit of this English course I have chosen to write on "Is young people today speaking more poorly than they used to?"

And I have found some rather interesting facts.

Apparently, this has always been the opinion, young people have always been slandered for they way they speak, the use of slang has always been looked down on, even in the 30's. Apparently though, we can not blame it all on the youngsters using slang and swearwords, as this is still part of our childhood ways of learning a language, by mimics!

According to Fredrik Lindström this is how young children learn a language, together with creativity, to be able to express themselves when they do not know the words for how to.

I have also read a very interesting project made by Rickard Jonsson, who has done his research on language and masculinity in a 14-15 year old class. Very interesting to see how young people (most of them immigrants) reason when speaking about social status, homosexuality and life and the future, a lot different from when I was that age, and that was less than ten years ago.

I won't tell to much of the essay before I have finished it, but it really is a interesting subject. But the subject have three main areas; social status, gender distinction and sexual orientation. You are supposed to be who you are, nothing more, nothing less, you have to be a part of the norm, to prove yourself without bragging.

Well, I will see if I can give you the essay in full text when it is finished!

Bye!

Road trip, Stroganoff and Friday

Well, then it was time again.

Off to Karlstad tonight, as I am off to Oslo for a leadership course tomorrow morning at 07.00.

Then back home on Sunday.

Next weekend, a new leadership course during a weekend in Sunne, and then 15th November my trips back and forth between Stockholm, Linköping and home will start, I don't really look forward to it that much to be honest.

Well, as I realized I have food that I can't leave or eat that will go bad till I get home on Sunday I decided to make a stroganoff for future lunchboxes. And as usual, the food is 100% vegetarian and lactose free.

Ingredients:

5 soy sausages

1 onion

3 dl of lactose free 10% cream

½ of low fat milk

3-4 dl of heinz chili sauce

3 tomatoes choped in small pieces

Chop the onion and sausages into pieces and fry them till they are cooked. Add the cream and the chili sauce until it's hot and then add the tomato pieces and milk.

Cook till tomatoes are soft and serve with rice.

A fun thing is that today I bought a new coat (looking a lot like one I have that is starting to break) and two pair of pants, so now I will have to make sure I go to the gym so that they will fit, as I think that if I gain weight they won't!

Well, it's time to go finish the packing and start reading books on children's language.

See you on Monday again!

Martial arts is not a hobby, it is a lifestyle...

Well, I have been doing martial arts now for a bit more than three years, and I have come to realize that no matter what martial art you do, it is not just a hobby, it become a style of life.

Benefits when doing martial arts is many. You get a confidence, you get a good posture and probably an change in attitude. You also get strength, cardio, flexibility and you become more relaxed both when training and as a person, you learn to relax, and I think this is a common treat to all martial arts, whether you do Aikido, Kali Sikaran, Brazilian Ju-jutsu or MMA.

No martial art is better than another, even though if you are part of a martial arts group you think yours is the best. And instead of going around saying everyone else is doing it wrong or their style is wrong, why not put down the energy and effort into yourself and to grow as a martial arts person in the one you think are the ultimate one in that case?

No matter what style or sport you do, everyone puts down just as much effort as the other one, the amount of training is just as much, then if a MMA-fighter might be "less" good at one, but a bit good at many different parts of martial art, then so be it, that is the purpose with their training, and that is a completely focus than for example Judo and Aikido has.

If we take an example, Aikido does not train sweeps, but you do in Brazilian Ju-jutsu and Judo (for example) how can you then say that Aikido is the ultimate way to defend your self? But just because of that, the focus of Aikido is not wrong, the main idea of Aikido is to use the opponents force against himself, and that is also a good main idea, and then you do a lock of some sort to keep the other one down. Neither is optimal, neither is wrong, both are great ways of training.

I have my self been doing Aikido for just a bit over three years now and Kali Sikaran since January this year, and I can't see anything but positive things about doing more than one martial art at the time either, you can find similarities and differences and when you do the question "does this really work?" will pop into your head, and a whole new dimension of martial arts is a head of you. Of course there is backsides to this, if you want to be good at one budo- or fighting art if you mix it together but that is a question about whether you understand the concept of the differences, and that can take years to learn, and it is a question on when you feel mature enough to be able to do more than one martial art at the time. But even here, it's a question on focus, do you "just" want to be good at that martial arts, or do you want to know how to defend yourself in realistic situations... They are all valid reasons to do martial arts, the only important to remember is to always have a respect for your partner because you need him or her to be better at what you are doing.

People should stop hating so much on everyone else, and get back to the focus needed for their own training. No one gains anything unless you show each other respect both on and off the tatami.

I hope to see you soon on seminars and take care!

Rather bored...

Well, not just bored, but pissed off, nothing works today.

Let us take the day from beginning to end.
1 .before I had even got out of bed, a phone salesman calls and wakes me up, not very early, but as I had been up late working, I hadn't had that much sleep.
2. The dishwasher is impossible to get to work, as if I screw it on the tap, the rest of the hose is fallinf off, so if i put it on the hose, then it falls of the tap.. See my problem?
3. I got my essay back, a 500 word essay and got the comment: "to shallow", how are we supposed to make a in-depth analysis on 6 or something articles and find the sex of 6 different speakers?
4. Did not have time to eat properly.
5. It was raining and my umberella is completley gone.
6. Kali did not go so very well...
7. Found out I might have been able to cheat with not having to watch the Western film as I hate Westernfilms.
8. I can't find my comic book ANYWHERE! It really is gone

And now I have done more homework than I managed to do during the whole day, and out of boredom, I found a pen and a paper and drew a bit, this was what it became.

A cute little ghost, just soooo right for it soon being Halloween.

Well Im actually gonna go to bed now, as I don't want more horrbile things to happen to me...

Bye!

No freeze!

Well, then my cap is done, least the first try-out version of it. The one I will make for my self to use will be black and white instead.













The one thing I noticed when taking a photo of it, it looks like a mushroom, like, the Mario mushroom. I wonder if any nerds would be happy if I made a red and white one!?


I think I will have to do it some day, just because of the fun of it!

There is a button missing, but I haven't bought any yet, so just imagine one please? I just haven't decided what colour goes best with the marine blue and ice blue colours of the cap... Maybe something fun, like... Mint green or something. I think yellow is the colour for my black and white cap! That will be quite cute!

Well, I better star doing some school work now so I can have the weekend off... Going to Oslo on Saturday for a leadership course...
Bye!

Recipe time! Leftover Minestrone

Thought it was time for a new recipe again. This recipe is a vegetarian Minestrone soup I made from leftovers. It's lactose free and completley meat free, but of course if you would like to use meat instead of soy and regular cremé fraishe, that is also possible.

After realising there was about nothing at all left in my fridge except this weeks leftover I decided to do a quick Minestrone soup.
The word Minestrone is Italian and means "The Big Soup" or well, the soup with loads of ingredients (think I heard that on Jamie Oliver's show once too...)

Ingredients:
2 cups of quorn or soy filling
1 onion
2-3 potatoes
1 cup of pasta or noodles
2 cups of red lentils (boiled)
1½ cup of Heinz chili sauce
2 cups of mixed beans and chick peas (this was made from tin packaged, but if you want they can be made by fresh ones too, but remember to put them in water and boil them at the right time before adding them)
4 table spoons of lactose free cremé fraische (for a more vegan alternative, use soy-yoghurt)
about 1 litre of water (thickness depends on your liking, the more water, the thinner soup)

If you go with fresh un-cooked food, the potatoes and lentils takes about 20 min each so keep that in mind.
Start by chopping the onion and fry it together with the soy/quorn in a casserole. Add the water and put the lentils and potatoes in and let boil for about 20 min. After 8-10 minutes, add the pasta (if using noodles, they cook in 3 minutes). When the potatoes and lentils are boiled, add the chili sauce and the cremé fraishe and add the beans. Mix it all together and take it of the stove.
Serve with a teaspoon of cremé fraiche and bread.

(Of course this works with prepared cooked food to, then there will be no cooking time to speak of... Just add the ingredients and let it simmer for a few minutes and it's ready to eat).

First time I made this, I had to little chili sauce and to little water, so it didn't look to appetizing, and for those who have seen "The young ones", it resembled Neil's lentil stew a lot, except with potatoes. But adding a bit more water and chili sauce made it get that orange Minestrone soup color I'm used to...

Next recipe will probably be my peanut-cookie ice cream cake. So look out for that one!

Analysing Obama

Todays school work includes a assignment on analysing a speech by Obama, unfortunate, the present President of the United States, does not follow the rules of speeches. I thought that after analysing speeches by Tony Blair and George W. Bush, this would not be to hard, and that I could maybe even get a really good grade, but no sir no, of course not.

The speech (I will not read the whole one) is addressed the Muslim world and the tensions between the American and the Muslim/Arab world.
And boy does that guy try to tamper with peoples emotions!
It reeks Pathos from this speech!

He is honored to be there, there has to be mutual respect from the two sides, he is bringing up history of the two sides, hi brings up his own childhood in an attempt to get the audience on his side, his own personal history and how he has Muslims in his family from Kenya, and what a great way to make him and the audience he is addressing a "us", a great way to make him a part of the Muslim world too, even though he is a Christian, and he is appealing to the Muslims idea of not killing Muslim, he is trying to be seen as a Muslim in the eyes of the extremists, and not a Christian and therefore not a treath.

I have as I said, not read the whole speech, but the assignment was on parts of it, but I will link you to the whole speech: http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1902738,00.html#ixzz0wr22SFSF

I don't know if Obama is better as a President, the war is still going on and I can't see any stop to it yet, and I have no idea what he has actually done since he came in power (care to enlighten me?), but at least he is a better speaker than Bush, just the fact he is not messing up the speeches is a good deal better than what Bush ever managed to do.
But we will see how this ends up when his 4 year period is over.
But I don't think the problem is in Iraq, the problem is all over the world, it's not the Muslims who need to be stopped, but the extremists, of all kinds, not just terrorists, but nazis, rasists, communists...

Obama is speaking about stereotypes, and he wants the Muslims not to see America as a stereotype, as he wants the Americans not to see the Muslims as stereotype, but the stereotype he is mentioning (" America is not the crude stereotype of a self-interested empre") it's unfortunate so say, that the Americans looks like the that to so many more places than just the Muslim world, and I think the quote "When America sneezes, the world gets teh cold" is a good way to finish this post.

(The picture is taken from http://www.getreligion.org/wp-content/photos/barack_obama2.jpg)

Not so creative...

Past days have been so much school work, that I haven't had the time to do anything creative, even though I have been knitting while watching films, and hopefully during the weekend, my first try of a cap will be finnished. It looks nice at the moment, but we will see, I'm trying with colors that don't match, and the one I will actually do for myself will be black and white...
But more about that when it's finnished. Also, I have brought some fabric to make super cool spider-man pillow cases! They will be awesome!

Today I got a lovely pair of winter shoes! The are so awesome! Too expensive though, but they wont be out of date next winter either so it doesn't matter, just hope they keep whole for more that a year, that my friends, will be a challande!

So nice.

Saw a film the other night, The Wild Bunch, and I suddenly realised why I never watch Western films. They are really boring. I can't even write an analysis of this as I don't even get it. I don't know who was the bad guy and who was the good ones, and there was so much speech in Spanish as I had no subtitles so I didn't understand any of it, but I guess it was alright if you like Western films.
The story was quite lame, a guy who got a mission and rode of to get his men, a bunch of, well, I don't know, who went of to Mexico, and fuck with some Mexican general and stuff. I really didn't get the film.

Later I will watch a film called Koyaanisqatsi, I have never heard of it, but it will be fun to see if it's any good, apparently it's going to be some experimental film, or something like that. Will try and finish my cap also then!

Just a minute ago I screwed together a chair too! Woho! The first chair in this house! I still can't eat at the table, but I can now do my schoolwork at my desk! Making progress. I just fear for how to move all of it next year, will be fun to watch I bet!

Well, I better start watching the film and have some dinner and later it's time for Dr Pepper float! Nom!

See you!

Spooky photosession...

That was that day...
Well, the weather was not nice a bit cold, but at least it didn't rain, so I went out an hour and a half or something, taking some photots. And as usual, I went to my favourite place for picture taking, the churchyard. I think that next weekend I will go there in the evening, think I can get some really nice pictures then! Okay, you might think I am crazy, but I can't do much about that... That's your opinion ;)

You will get a taste of the pictures I took here, but the rest is found at:
http://sanna-b.deviantart.com/gallery/#Me-as-a-model

This ones I put on here will be my favourites though (they end up in Picasa webalbum in case you want to check there instead).

But as I said, next week, I will try and take some in the evening instead, to get some real Halloween feeling for them, but then I wont be so vain so that I only take pictures of my self (there are pictures without me, but they are to many at the moment to go trough, and I will do that when I have more time to DO things. But it was really nice today to take a break and do something that I think is fun. Last night the idea was to knit, and do some scrapping, but, it took to long time rolling up the yarn in a ball, and I need a ruler before I can finnish my Halloween cards anyway. So my creative side got a bit neglected...
But at least now I could do something, even though I for sure will knit when watching films later. It was so long since I last did, and I need a new cap.

In a bit I will go and watch Snow White. Haven't seen it in ages. Not since I was a kid, but I think it will be more interesting than the other film we were supposed to choose between, as I can't even remember the name of it, but I do not really look forward to having to watch a Western film, that's not really my cuppa tea at all! Unfortunate I can't watch either of the films and just enjoy it, as I have to watch for things, but on the other hand, I have already studied animation earlier and Snow White is the first ever film using cell-animation. But I think I will try and watch Coraline once more again, it's such a cute film. And the way they made the film reminds a lot about Nightmare before Christmas, and that's what I really DO wanna watch, unfortunate, it's not a part of my DVD collection yet.

Well, I better go do what I actually said I'm going to rather than sit here!

I will see if I can get my cap done till tomorrow! See you!

Lazy night!

Yeah, that's exactly what I will have.
Films, carrot sticks, guacamole and Dr Pepper, and to top it all of, films! Films, films and more films!
This could make any girls just as happy as anything else. Well, maybe a cup of tea could be nice too, I'll go make one in a bit...

Todays film choise:
The Birds
(Alfred Hitchcock of course! )

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0056869/ (lol, release date on my birthday!)

A film whit no soundtrack? Rather interesting, but I have to say... It would probably not be as scary as it actually is if it had violins playing like Mr Hitchcock has in Pshyco. Thw choise of film actually was because in "Film Art: An Introduction 7th Edition" (Bordwell & Thompson) is having more than just a few examples from the film in the editing part. And they did combine a lot of longshots, close ups and straight forward pictures with a few from "bird's eye view".
Other than that, I don't really think the cutting was so much better than in other films. I would say though, it is good, as he gets it in a POV, and you can se action and reaction on what is happening. This I would say, does not show the clip in cronological order that one clip is straight after another in time, but they happen at the same time.

Also, the next film choise is "Kaw", http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0491005/
I guess a remake of "The Birds", but a rather bad one. It looks like most modern thrillers/horror films. The first feeling you get of it it that it looks a lot like the remake of "Amityville Horror" from 2005 ( http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0384806/).

This makes a big difference from "The Birds". Less long shots, a soundtrack (don't every film have that now a days? Couldn't they just try and make one without, I wanna know whether that works or not), and many clips to make the tempo go up in big parts of the film. A more modern way of doing horror films basically as I said before...

Well, I don't like it, and it seems like most people don't like it if you look at the rating on IMDB.

But right now I don't feel like analyzing and comparing films, so you will have to be alright with me only mentioning them, got a lot to do with my English courses this weekend, but tomorrow I will have the whole day to work, so I hope I will finnish at least something. Right now, I don't even like studying English, and I so badly need a dictionary, I'm getting rather pissed of when my internet decides "Na ah, I won't work, so you won't get on either tyda.se or lexin", which is just *instert ugly word of choise*

But at the moment, I'm quite looking forward to the next week of Film studies as we will probably watch Snow White, and I can cheat! Yeeeeaaah! As I have already learned the history, and a lot more about animated films in another course I have taken, but I guess, everyone else will make it better than me anyway!

Hopefully, I will have my book by next week to! It feels so great to be able to mark things in the book, that you can use in essays and so on, and be able to look in, in the future. Maybe that's the reason so few of my grades are very good... I always have to give the books back to the library before I am finnished with them...

Now I'm blabbering... Better go finnish watching films and making tea...
Tomorrow, there will be pictures up here as I will try and have the time and take some nice autumn pictures outside (if the weather is good that is...)

See ya! :)

Decisions, decisions, decisions...

Some decisions are easy, some, a lot harder than expected, and I am already nervous for the future. I mean, if everything go as planned, in less than 11 months, I will move from here to Växjö! If that don't succeede, I will move here to Uppsala. I mean, things could be less scary. And if neither of it succeeds, I will take part 1 of 2 of a documentary course in Linköping. Life is just as hard as you make it!
Yeah I know I live on my own at the moment, but I have my parents less than an hour away by car, I have my grandmother and brothers and friends in the same town, the only one not that close, is my boyfriend, which I still have to be on a train for a minimum of 1½ hour to see, wherever I go.

But I want this. I think it is right.

The hardest thing to leave?
Except my parents and family, it must be the aikido/kali clubs, specifically my sensei(s), and this means Iwill come home as often as I can, to train, hard.

Even though it scares me, it fills me with a calmness. I think it will be alright, I have about found someone to live in my flat while I am away (someone who will not re-paint or destroy it in an other way!!!) and I am good to go.

The decision was quite easy to make when I realised what amazing film teachers there is in Växjö (at least so far) and when realising exactly what I want to study in English, the decision to at some point in life living in Uppsala was not that hard either. Life is good when decisions are so hard, but still so easy to make.

So in mid-august 2011, my stuff will be put on a trailer and going somewhere else in Sweden. It is already making me nervous as hell to think of sometimes. This flat, that I have put down so much effort in making "my own personal space", will be someone else, and I have to live in a rental flat, with most probably light colours. Just that fact makes me nervous!

Next summer I will (probably) take my last class in a long while in Karlstad (and I have even noticed that one that I want to take, have a good similar one in Linköping), but maybe one day I will come back and study (more?) Documentary filming.

Well, bring on the future, I am ready for all your takes and turns!

Best film in a while!

Been watching "The Others" today, a really good film with Nicole Kidman.

Nicole Kidman, here as Grace Stewart, has with her children moved into a big house, waiting for her husband to come home from the war. Three people comes knocking on her door and asks for work and after a while her daughter starts to see a boy, whom none of the others can see, but after a while Grace starts to feel the presence of something non-human. When her husband then comes home, the mystique is closing up on you.

The story is not something completley new, it does not always look the same, but the basic concept is the same. An unbeliver who starts to believe after and encounter, the spooky house maids and gardners, the child who sees ghosts. All are elements that exists in other films, the thing that makes this film really good is light and sound.
As the kids are sensitive to light, big curtains are always drawn, and therefore, sound is not as it's supposed to be. Also there is a lot of whispering, which makes the atmosphere as there is secrets, things not everyone is allowed to hear. And as all the curtians is there, there is always dark, very rarelly light. Together with the whispering, and the lack of sound, the mice-en-scene gets rather interesting, you never know what lurks in the corners, what will jump out in the next dark hallway or whom will show up next. You hear sounds, but you don't know what's making them.

The film in all is an incredibly good film. The end is not suspected (at least not from me!) and it's frightening in a way impossible to tell.

An interesting thing would have been to watch the film without the soundtrack, but with the sound (e.g steps, cracks and so on, but without the music) as I think it would be real scary.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0230600/