For Those Visual Learners

You Too Wells Fargo!

Colin Stokes TED Talk: "How Movies Teach Manhood"

The Elder Scrolls Online- "Alliances at War" Trailer

Book Guilt

So I was on the YouTubes today, and I came across a video by Kristina Horner (a.k.a: italktosnakes) called I've Got Book Guilt. When she explained the concept, I thought to myself, "I've totally got that too!". Basically, book guilt is where you really like reading (like Kristina, I used to read all the time as a kid), but you occupy your time with other things (like the internet, video games, or TV). The kicker here is that you don't stop buying books, leading to a large back-log of unread books on your shelf. It is straight-up embarrassing how large mine is... I really need to start reading more! So in order to (hopefully) motivate me to read more and get through/experience these books, I'm posting all of them here on my blog. Books that are part of a trilogy/series that I haven't read will just have the first book of the series, or the next one I haven't read yet listed.

• Peter Pan- J.M. Barrie
• The Scions of Shannara- Terry Brooks
• Angels & Demons/The Da Vinci Code- Dan Brown
• Academ's Fury- Jim Butcher
• Don Quixote- Miguel de Cervantes
• The Last of the Mohicans- James Fenimore Cooper
• 1356/Sharpe's Tiger/Rebel- Bernard Cornwell
• The Terminal Man/The Great Train Robbery- Michael Crichton
• Robinson Crusoe- Daniel Defoe
• The Lost World- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
• The Count of Monte Cristo/The Three Musketeers/The Man in the Iron Mask- Alexandre Dumas
• The Pawn of Prophecy- David Eddings

---Here is approximately where Kristina's list would end (numbers-wise)---

• Magician: Apprentice- Raymond E. Feist
• Debt of Bones/The Pillars of Creation- Terry Goodkind
• Flight of the Fallen- Mary H. Herbert
• Les Misérables- Victor Hugo
• Genghis: Birth of an Empire- Conn Iggulden
• New Spring/Winter's Heart- Robert Jordan
• Night of Blood- Richard A. Knaak
• The Templar Salvation- Raymond Khoury
• Hood- Stephen Lawhead
• A Game of Thrones- George R.R. Martin
• The Skies of Pern- Anne McCaffrey
• Sabriel- Garth Nix
• Mistborn- Brandon Sanderson
• The Crystal Shard- R.A. Salvatore
• The Name of the Wind- Patrick Rothfuss
• Ivanhoe- Sir Walter Scott
• East of Eden- John Steinbeck
• Treasure Island- Robert Louis Stevenson
• Dracula- Bram Stoker
• Sanctuary- Paul B. Thompson & Tanya C. Cook
• The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrún- J.R.R. Tolkien
• War & Peace- Leo Tolstoy
• Dragons of Autumn Twilight- Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman
• The Picture of Dorian Gray- Oscar Wilde

Yeah... I think I may have a problem. Not necessarily a problem with not enough to read, or not anything good to read, but that I'm not reading enough.

How Gaming & Violence Really Work

If Pokemon Were Real

So with Nintendo announcing their next generation of Pokemon games last week, it got me thinking- what if Pokemon were real? Would I be a trainer, breeder, gym leader, etc.? What Pokemon would I catch & keep? Well, here's a list of Pokemon I would want to have if they were actually real (along with the trailer for Pokemon X & Y). This is definitely a culled down list- of the current total of Pokemon (which is 646) I narrowed it down to the 126 that I actually like, and then narrowed it down further to Pokemon I would consider as "my favorites". So this is actually only a list of 23 Pokemon that I would really want to have. I'd still try to catch the other 103, of course, but these would be my most desirable ones. They are in no particular order.

• Charizard
• Arcanine
• Rapidash
• Kingler
• Scyther
• Lapras
• Vaporeon
• Jolteon
• Zapdos
• Noctowl
• Houndoom
• Grovyle
• Aggron
• Sharpedo
• Numel
• Kyogre
• Floatzel
• Leafeon
• Serperior
• Zebstrika
• Excadrill
• Krookodile
• Braviary

What Pokemon would you have on your team? What type of job would you want to have? I think I would be a trainer, then maybe a gym leader when I got older. Most of my favorites are Fire or Ground type anyway.

Print Books vs. E-Books/Readers

I'd like to think that both print books and e-books can coexist happily with each other. Publishing companies will still be able to sell either medium, so there shouldn't be much- if any- price fluctuations, lay offs, or bankruptcies. This just means that we as consumers have the option to read either a paper bound novel or an e-book, or both! I think that it really depends on your preference and/or your lifestyle. I personally prefer reading print books- I love the smell, the feel, and the giant library, but if I led a more active lifestyle where I would be traveling a lot and on the go, an e-reader would be more advantageous. I think that the medium of the books doesn't matter as long as we still have easy access to the information- especially to the younger generation. I'm all for video games, movies, and TV- they're great, but I see more time spent on these mediums these days rather than reading. To be perfectly honest; I think this is causing the younger generations to become less intelligent, which is really sad.