This blog sponsored by…
I’m going to shamelessly plug some products/brands in this blog. Because I want to.
Actually, this was brought on by buying like seven pairs of headphones at the Moscow Walmart because they don’t have these headphones in Canada and they’re my absolute favorite.
So let’s start with those!
Claudia-Endorsed Product #1: Koss Headphones
Everyone knows (or at least you do now!) that I listen to music when I walk. I wear on-ear headphones because the little in-ear buds hurt after about 10 minutes and I can never get them placed in my ears so that they stay put when I’m moving around. I have a really good and expensive pair of on-ear Bose headphones back at home—they’re soft and noise reducing and have great sound—but I don’t usually like to wear them during my walks because I’m super rough on headphones and don’t want to break those.
Instead, I wear these:
Not only do these headphones only cost $4.88 at Walmart, but they have really, really good sound. They don’t sound like $5 headphones. They sound more like the Bose ones. Sure, they’re not nearly as durable and thus break more frequently (though I guess “frequently” is a relative term; I go through about 3 or 4 of these a year because I’m rough on headphones), but they’re cheap to replace. If you like on-ear headphones and don’t want to spend like $50+ on a good set, I’d recommend these, since the sound is still really, really good despite the low price. You can also order them from the Koss website.
Claudia-Endorsed Product #2: Saucony Kinvara Shoes
You knew my shoes had to be on here. I love my Kinvaras. Not only are they very comfortable (at least for my feet), but they are very, very durable little shoes. Note that I don’t run in them, I just walk, but I’d suspect that they’d endure running pretty well, too.
Here is my current Kinvara 5 pair next to my original Kinvara 3 pair. They both look holey and ratty as hell, right? That’s because I have at least 750 miles on the newer ones and 1,500 miles on the older ones.
The older ones are still technically wearable, too. I bet I could go another 400 at least before the soles actually start wearing all the way through, haha. If you walk a lot or just want a pair of shoes that will last you a long time, try these out.
Claudia-Endorsed Product #3: L.L. Bean backpacks
I think I’ve gone through a total of four of these backpacks, and I’ve been using them ever since I was in first grade. Not only are they durable (I think I might be even harder on my backpacks than I am on my headphones), but they can hold a LOT of stuff and they’re pretty waterproof, too. Plus, you can get one in lime green. What’s not to like?
I had like five other things in mind, but I got distracted by R and now I can’t remember any of them.
OOH! R!
Claudia-Endorsed Product #4: R
I don’t know if this even counts as a product, but whatevs. R is a great statistical software package because a) it’s free, and b) it’s like SAS’s little brother who wants to be just like big brother SAS, but cheaper, because c) it’s free. So if you’re ever in need of some statistical analysis software and aren’t afraid of a little coding, go here and download R.
Guys. GUYS.
Look at this freaking tree. Look at how amazing it is. Look at how puny those guys look in comparison to it.
So cool.
I’m going to need to locate a copy of that National Geographic issue.
Antiques
Fun fact: when I was a young kid, I thought “antiques” was pronounced AN-tee-kwez.
Anyway. Despite the mini little snow storm Moscow is getting, my mom and I went to that big antiques store on Main Street, kind of by Rosauers. I got a caliper ‘cause I’m weird and an old phonology book ‘cause phonology is cool.
A guy named Albert Salisbury does indeed sound like a guy who would be a stickler for orthoepy. The child version of me would have angered him with my pronunciation of “antiques.”
It’s actually a pretty interesting little book. The first several pages even talk about the anatomy behind breathing, vocalization, and hearing.
Says Mr. Salisbury about silent letters: “Many of these are as useless as they are annoying.” Hahaha.
Can you answer his review questions? The Salisbury stakes are high!
(I’m sorry, I had to. I don’t even care about the heterograph.)
Peh.
Every once and awhile—like maybe every five or six months or so—I get the urge to just stop blogging.
I know, I know, the whole world would just dissolve into chaos if I ever did that, right?
I’m not sure why I feel that urge to quit every so often. I mean, it’s not like most of these posts require a lot of brain power to write (example, example, example). And Eigenblogger definitely breaks my “quality over quantity” rule when it comes to writing. I mean, have you seen the nonsense I post here? 98% of this blog is either “Claudia fills out another pointless survey”, “Claudia finds a song she really likes”, or “LOL INTERNETZ.” So it’s not hard to keep blogging.
Actually, my occasional lack of drive when it comes to blogging likely stems, at least in part, to that frivolity. Who cares, anyway? I only rarely post something of worth to anyone but myself, and even then it’s not that interesting or exciting or funny. But then I have to remember that regardless of what I’m posting, I’m posting something—I have a record of this day happening, even if that record is just a YouTube video or a dumb comment or one of my many rants. And that’s really why I blog in the first place, to keep a record of the days that have passed, and know that I’ll (hopefully) have a record of a grand total of 10,000 days of my life once I’m done with this whole project.
But every once and awhile, I still I get the urge to just stop blogging.
Edumacation
Hello again from 2015!
Let’s start the year off with some interesting numbers, eh? Specifically, some numbers regarding different fields of education in the United States.
The above.gif (source) shows the field type of Bachelor’s degrees by state, ranked by top percent of degree by field. I can’t read as fast as the .gif goes, so here are the screenshots for each type of degree. Click on the piccys to make them grow.
Business:
Education:
Psychology and Social Sciences:
Science and Engineering-Related:
Engineering:
Biological, Agriculture, and Environmental Science:
Liberal Arts and History:
Literature and Language:
Computers, Mathematics, and Statistics:
Visual and Performing Arts:
Communications:
Physical and Related Sciences:
Idaho’s good at Communications and Ag…and not much else, haha.
2015!
Happy New Year, people!
2015 is going to be a good one. I can feel it. I don’t get those super intuitive-driven feelings very often, but when I do, they’re usually right.
And my super intuitive-driven feeling about 2015 is that it’s going to be fantastic—and hopefully that applies to everyone I know!
Here’s to 365 days of blogging, music, and awesomeness.
Eigenblogger 