A True Love

One of my dearest fascinations is worms. For as long as I can recall, earthworms have been a favourite animal of mine, and recently I have been permitted to farm them. That was so exciting: I had just gotten home, and sitting on my desk was a voucher for European nightcrawlers (Eisenia hortensis). Mother came in, and said, "Krystyn, you're into UCLA, you deserve this". Oh my, how wonderful! Anyway, I started out with 25, and at this point they've outgrown their current habitat so I've since moved them outside. A few of them are over a foot long, and I do believe they've multiplied, too. 

There are over 2,000 species of earthworms, and approximately 650 of those species are found is Australia. Here is an example of how remarkable some Australian worms are.

And here's a compelling concept:

"...it may be doubted if there are any other animals which have played such an important part in the history of the world as these lowly organized creatures."
- Charles Darwin [on the wonder of earthworms]

Isn't it romantic? Er, ironic...

Is it just me, or is it somewhat ironic that all of this high technology was designed to make life easier for us and so that tasks take less time, and yet so much of our time is spent with high technology in general?

Who would have thought?

Recently I attended a lecture through the LOGIC Club at UCLA about Global Capitalism, and an emphasis of this lecture was the importance of the mind, and how the root of productivity is through innovation, invention, exploration, and so forth. All of this is accomplished through the mind. Hopefully this is a concept that doesn't need too much more explanation, or rather that you wouldn't consider to be a new idea at all. 

The next day the psychology class at school had a brain specialist visiting, and with him a spinal chord, a left-brain, and a full brain unceremoniously floating in a bucket. Students were allowed to handle the specimens with gloves, and I eagerly placed myself in line. I didn't feel that it would be a big deal, besides being a cool thing about which one could Twitter. Actually, seconds before holding the full brain I recall thinking exactly, 'This won't have a big impact on me.' Wrong. I believe part of it was the lecture, but, I mean, weighing down my hands was this large, wet, soggy lump of dense, grey sponge that coincidentally contains and, for that matter, maintains our very essence. It was the epitome of active life just soaking in a tub of formaldehyde...

Speaking of brains, this fabric brain art is uber amazing.

...and so is this fabric craft, even if it's not of a brain.

A Few More Twitter Chirps

And another thing!

With Twitter, typically if you're going to keep up with the Twitter community you're not giving yourself enough time to mull over the events you experience. It's as though you're merely reporting and not absorbing. 

I'd be interested to read about an encounter, but not merely that it happened. Most of the time I don't care what people do. I care about what or how they think.

(Please refer to "Blogging and Twitter and Whatnot" for part one.)

Laugh a Little

I was recently asked how I spend most of my time on the World Wide Web, and besides research and perusing the typical social networking sites, I'm generally surfing through webcomics, which really isn't too much of a shock.

The following question was, "which ones?", which, again, isn't too much of a shock. But, hey, who says this is supposed to be a Palahniuk novel, anyway? Well, maybe there aren't shocks in a Palahniuk novel, either, so, nevermind. Regardless, here's a little list:

First of all, Dinosaur Comics is a must. (MUST.)

Kate Beaton is now "Hark, a Vagrant", and it's still amazing.

I totally adore Indexed.

Cat and Girl likes to comment on librarianship (among other things, duh).

XKCD is (now) classic. (And isn't it great that one can refer to it as such?)

I really enjoy the Perry Bible Fellowship.

Wondermark is a kick.

Subnormality sometimes hurts my eyes, but is nice.

And, shock-shock, Penny Arcade... Enough said.

"1 pizza, please!"

Could this be ordering pizza in the future?

Obama and the Media (Links)

It's about time someone brought this up...

Haha! Hilarious.

How great is the Onion?

Masters of Illusion: Impossible Magic

Since some of you have been asking about my appearances on FOX's series "Masters of Illusion", here's the scoop.

The season started in January, and is still going. I've been on all of the episodes so far, and will continue to be as the season progresses (primarily performing close-up/street magic with my stage portions scattered throughout). And yes, there will be new episodes aired uber soon!

The show is on every Monday night at 8pm on FOX MyNetwork.

Thanks so much for all of your support! Please stay tuned!

Remember this?

25 Random KL Facts:

1. I’m a huge zombie buff. I love zombie satire, lore, movies, and gore. I think I’d like to find myself a zombie boyfriend, because I know he’ll love me for my brain.

2. I take notes nearly compulsively. I’m obsessed with efficiency, and generally map out everything out in some capacity before doing whatever it is I’m going to do.I carry around a small field-recording device with me to collect sounds anywhere I go.

3. I carry around a small field-recording device with me to collect sounds anywhere I go.

4. I honestly cannot imagine my life without magic.

5. When I grow up I want to be some concoction of Tom Waits, April Winchell, and John Cleese.

6. I’m chiefly interested in linguistics (evolutionary, historical), philosophy, psychology (evolutionary, child development), theatre (playwriting, direction), anthropology (language development), human twins, religious studies, zeppelins, post-life decay, Suburban history, European history, sound design/Foley art, poetry, and the sham of the Kennedy family. Oh, and sea monsters.

7. I like orange juice with lots of pulp.

8. I am almost overly inquisitive. I’m quite opinionated, though.

9. Paul Johnson is my hero.

10. My favourite holiday has always been Valentine’s Day. I think it’s wonderful to have a day where we can openly express admiration for humans, romantically or otherwise, and have it be socially acceptable.

11. Grammar is my life.

12. I’m a romantic realist and a semantic idealist.

13. If I could make anything appear out of thin air (as I’m often asked) it would be smooth verbal transitions to avoid awkward moments in conversation.

14. I experience dejavu exceedingly frequently.

15. I have all sorts of relationships with numbers, letters, colours, works of art, most anything, really. (That’s all owing to my Synesthesia, though.)

16. I’ve been asked to lecture on the magic of Lewis Carroll at an upcoming magic convention, and am ridiculously excited.

17. I have chronic PND, so I often have to clear my throat. I also have a bladder deficiency so I often have to visit the restroom. (For more information of KL being an experimental case, please contact Simon.)

18. I have created a lot of characters, and a favourite hobby of mine is writing dialogs for them.

19. I’m especially addicted to Dinosaur Comics. Qwantz.com is amazing. My strongest entertainment addiction, however, is most certainly Monty Python. (I mean, talk about fanatic.)

20. My favourite food is probably super pretzels.

21. I maintain much paranoia. Some are fairly irrational, like fearing that sharks will jump out of random places such as darkened stairwells, toilets, trashcans, or sinks, but some are particularly practical, like being concerned about hand crank pencil sharpeners destroying my pencils before the SAT (which actually happened once). One of my newest involves Zuni Fetishes. (Thanks, Will.) Oh, gosh, and low flying planes! What the heck?

22. Water is very grounding for me. When I get frustrated or excited or just need to muse I’ll shower, bathe, or swim, etc.

23. My knees are double jointed, and I can lick my elbow.

24. I’m pretty much an Objectivist. Rand rocks my socks.

25. I’m always willing to offer author/book recommendations.

Gee, thanks, facebook.

Ok, there's a new facebook layout. 
Bizarre!

So now we make status update-like comments on each others wall, which is impersonal, if you write is as, "KRYSTYN LAMBERT is saying hi to you, Cassie!" If you don't write it that way, your name is just awkwardly there, which isn't really a big deal, but the subtle implications of this whole business are curious.

Wasn't it a little weird that we can write on our own walls... Sure, you're "status updating"... Sort of. Wasn't it sort of awkward to write on your own wall before this change... And now it's all ok? Maybe this one is just me...

Then the idea of everyone seeing your wall-to-wall makes me more paranoid that I was previously. This might be a place for friends, but... Well, at least the wall-to-wall feed, too, is controllable.

Also, gosh, "Share". What is all of this sharing nonsense? Did we do that before? I thought we just posted before. I don't want to "Share". And, "What's on your mind?" Please. What more, "Krystyn + Friends"? Enough.

Oh, and the general news feed... It's so clogged up with people's status reports. I mean, I care what people are up to, but I've just taken the time to log onto facebook, and that's not all I want to see. You know?

And now we can comment on other people's comments!? Where will this lead?

Gah, and there are plenty of other weird things, I'm sure. 

Besides, I thought an Obama campaign promise was to bring back the old facebook, anyway. (Hahaha.) 
I'm smelling something very fishy here.

Blogging and Twitter and Whatnot

I have officially joined the blogging community. Surprisingly, I'm feeling fairly alright with that. At least this "medium" (I think blogging is actually what one could consider a medium now. Crazy, huh?) expects some form of higher literacy, unlike our acquaintance, Twitter. 

I'm not feeling Twitter, at this point. Recently, I figured it would be a decent idea to find out what this website is. So, I did, and, oh my goodness, how impressive. I watched the video introduction, and learned about Carla, who "reads blogs everyday, is addicted to her mobile phone, and has contacts all over the world". Wow, Carla is a shinning example of how we all should be! Then, and I actually took a screen shot of this, it says, the message "is exactly 140 characters. It's not too many words, but that's what makes it great. Twitter means you do not ever have to read long messages". I understand that often less (or, in fact "Les",) is more, but somehow I don't think that's exactly what is meant. 

Also, that it's just status updates, and little else, I mean, what are we fostering here? Talk about addiction. "Krystyn just inhaled!" "Krystyn just exhaled!" Sure, some people may lead particularly interesting lives, but to turn around and blast that everywhere... Come on! And if you don't do that, you're not keeping up with the Twitter world, and then where would you be?

Thus I have taken up blogging, which I already sort of did, in order to keep up with our fascinating and fast twenty-first century world, without making too many sacrifices. We'll see where it goes.