The BerenSTAIN Bears Conspiracy Theory

I don't know how this happened, but I've made a post a day for the past three days. Don't expect this to keep happening. :p

Anyway, Channel Frederator on YouTube just released a new episode of Cartoon Conspiracy, one that is different than most of the rest of the series, in that this conspiracy is one that bleeds over into real life. Before you watch the video, think about your answer to this question: If you read the popular book series about a family of bears as a kid, what was that series called? Was it the BerenSTAIN Bears, or the BerenSTEIN Bears? Ok, proceed with the video.



For me the answer is... Both? I definitely remember pronouncing it BerenSTAIN Bears, but if you'd asked me how to spell it, I would have definitely spelled it BerenSTEIN.

I first read this conspiracy on the internet months ago, and people were posting old book covers with the -stein spelling. It was obvious that most of them had been photoshopped, but it really made me curious, what did the fronts of the really old editions say?

When I was a kid we had a pile of Berenstain Bears books, including a couple of, I'm pretty sure, the original library editions from the 60's. (My family was big into library book sales.) But as far as I know, all of them have been given away since I was a kid, so I had no way to look for myself.

I gave up thinking about it after awhile, and went on with my life. However, when I went to Chicago this summer, I stayed with my aunt and uncle, and I slept in what was my cousin Brittany's old room. Lo and behold, there on the bookshelf beside my blow-up mattress, were a bunch of original copies of some of the first Berenstain Bears books. On the covers of all of them, the name was spelled Berenstain. Mystery solved.

So while I don't believe in this conspiracy at all, I still find the whole thing fascinating; both the Mandela Effect, as well as the idea of alternate realities or parallel universes. I've always heard of these ideas, but really only in science fiction, and when I did hear about theoretical real life ones, I'd never heard a compelling argument for them. This was as close to a good argument as I've ever heard. Too bad it still falls apart. Oh well. :p

9

So, there's this thing going around Facebook, where people post a specific number of little known facts about themselves. At the end they say, "Like my post and I'll give you a number!" And then, you're supposed to go make your own. Normally I steer clear of these things. I don't like doing what's popular, especially on Facebook, (Whatever, I'm probably a hipster.) but I did decide to comment on my cousin Mandi's post, and she asked if I wanted a number. For some reason I agreed. (Whatever, I'm not THAT much of a hipster. :p) But since I'm still too cool for Facebook, I decided to turn it into a blog post instead. But unless someone BEGS me, I won't be passing out numbers. I still don't like following trends. :p The number that Mandi gave me was 9, so here are 9 things about me that you probably didn't know. Unless you're related to me. :p

1. The nature of the conversation that got me into this list was a discussion of My Little Pony. So I thought it fitting to use my first "Fact" to reveal that I was a brony before it was cool. (Wow. I sound so hipster...) Although I wouldn't call myself one now, I don't watch the show, don't have any toys, when I was a little kid, I loved them. This was mainly because I loved horses. I had a ton of realistic horse toys. I also loved bright colors, as most kids do, and My Little Ponies were both. I don't think I saw them as "Girl's Toys" I just saw rainbow horses, and they were cool.

2. This fact is easily followed by the fact that I liked other things that one would consider girly too. I liked Lisa Frank stickers, I played Barbies with my cousin Shaina, though I used non-Barbie toys, and she had the dolls. (My Lion King toys were my all time favorites at that age.) I did want a Ken doll though, because I thought that would be the boy equivalent to a Barbie. I was breaking down those gender barriers at such a young age. :p

3. My next fact is that I have been a fanboy since I was about 10. (For those of you who have never heard the term, a fanboy, or fangirl, is someone who obsesses over something, a movie, a TV show, a book, a singer, pretty much anything that can qualify as a fandom) My first series that I obsessed over was a PBS show called Wishbone. I had other shows that I had liked a lot before then, Carmen Sandiego, The Magic School Bus, Zoom, but this was my first legitimate obsession. I tried to tape every single episode, I bought the movie, I bought the books, I even bought a stuffed Wishbone plush toy. I couldn't get enough.

4. In addition to television shows, I have gotten obsessed with various book series over the years, and my first big obsession was a series called The Boxcar Children. I loved those books so much. My cousin Shaina and I even made up a club in honor of them, called The Boxcar Children Club. We even made up our own theme song. No I will not sing it for you.

5. Let's move on to more recent years for the rest of these. Over the last couple of years I have lost around 50 lbs. I've always had health problems that have made losing weight difficult, but in the last couple of years I've started to manage them a bit better, and because of that, I've lost quite a bit of weight. I think that it is still coming off, even though the scale hasn't shown it recently, because for the last couple of weeks, I have found it increasingly difficult to keep my pants up. Apparently I need to start wearing a belt...

6. A lot of people get really personal with these things, and I've been debating with myself whether or not I should do so as well. So I don't get TOO personal, I decided to just do one single entry. I don't usually like getting very personal, so it remains to be seen if I will even keep this in the post. Over the last few years I've changed my views on a lot of things. I used to be a die hard Baptist/Republican/Conservative/Fundamentalist/I'm right/You're wrong kind of a person. Not so much any more. I came to realize what kind of a person that kind of a harsh, judgmental attitude made me, and I didn't like it. I decided to leave it behind. Now I don't claim any denomination, or political affiliation, and my life has been infinitely better since then. I am now one of those people who doesn't like to discuss religion or politics, because I know what those kinds of discussions can do to relationships. Especially on Facebook. You can post one innocent comment and someone will jump down your throat like you were the devil himself! I've found it's much better just to let people think they're right, and salvage your relationship, rather than prove them wrong and have them hate you.

7. Well, that was pretty heavy. Let's lighten this up a bit, shall we? How about this? Here's something that no one knows about me. Well, except for a few people I don't even know in person. I have a secret blog. Whoops, I guess it's not so secret anymore... Any of you ever heard of a little site called tumblr? Yeah, I've had a blog there since right before I moved to Ames, and I published the first official post a couple of months ago. I mainly use it as a place to re-post my fiction, and write about my fandoms. I'm hoping that I'll eventually find an audience other than my family and friends, who read my stuff because they actually like it, not just because they know me. So far I have 19 followers! Followers who found me and subscribed, without me asking them to read my stuff at all. They just came, liked what they saw, and kept coming back!

8. Which brings me to number 8. Why do I want strangers to read my work? Because eventually I want to be a published author. I have a ton of ideas for stories that I could write. Every time I think of a new one I open the "Notebook" on my iPad and quickly type it in before I forget it. I have so many ideas I don't know where to start. I don't even know if any of them are any good. A lot of them are just generic sci-fi/fantasy ideas that I want to put my own spin on. I can't decide if I want them to be serious, or if I want them to be funny. Ideally I'd like them to be similar in tone to Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events books. He has the perfect blend of laugh out loud funny, and deadly serious. I'm not really sure how to capture that without blatantly copying his style though.

9. Last, but not least, and probably the most unlikely of all my "Dreams" is that some day, I would like to be a voice actor. I have loved cartoons ever since I first watched Looney Tunes cartoons and Disney movies as a kid. If I could somehow lend my voice to an animated character, my life would be complete. I'd love to work on cartoons in general, but to actually voice a character, would be so awesome. :)

So, there's my list. I'm sure you learned at least one new thing about me. Hopefully you enjoyed it. If any of you are interested, you can find the link to my tumblr HERE. And if you know someone who you think would find my writing humorous, (They'd have to be quite the weirdo themselves... :p) share this blog, or my tumblr with them. I'd love for more people to be able to enjoy what I write. :)

Reading Rainbow Remix

PBS just released another remix, and it is just as good as the previous 3. :)



Reading Rainbow was one of the main shows I watched as a little kid. I was always a reader, but this show reinforced not just my love of reading but learning as well. I was exposed to so much more information about that world thanks to this show. I hope kids today have a show this good to spark their imaginations, and foster a love of learning.

Oz: The Great and Powerful

What is it about magical worlds that captivate me so much? Wonderland, Narnia, Neverland, Middle Earth. If it's a world where weird stuff happens, I'm there, and I love it. One of my favorite magical lands is getting another reimagining next year, and it looks AMAZING!

No, this is not a new version of "The Wizard of Oz." This is a completely different story altogether! This Oz is about the Wizard, before he was the Wizard. How he came to Oz from our world, and how he eventually came to be the Wizard.



I can't wait for this movie! I completely geeked out when I realized that they were switching aspect ratios in the middle of the film, having the first part in our world be in Black and White, and Full Screen, and then switching to Color and Widescreen once he gets to Oz. Yeah, that's a completely nerdy thing to get excited about, but I don't care, I LOVE the idea! If it goes well, I hope that they keep going and turn this into a whole franchise, following the entire book series.

When I was little, I really liked the 1930's MGM version of the Wizard of Oz. I remember the first time I found it at the library, Mom didn't want to get it for me because she thought it would scare me. Apparently she was wrong about that though, because eventually she did check it out for me, and I remember watching it multiple times growing up.

When I was older, I looked for the book and checked it out from the library to read. I read the book and I loved it. And even though I will always "Really Like," the 1930's Wizard of Oz, I've always held a *Very, very mild* grudge against it for straying so far from the book.

The Oz pictured in this trailer looks absolutely amazing, and I would love to see a more faithful adaptation of the book set in this version of Oz.

Even though I loved The Wizard of Oz as a kid, I am slightly ashamed to admit that I never read the entire series. The library didn't have any of the other books, and I never thought about trying to find them. Why, I don't know. The Wizard of Oz was always one of my favorite books, I even bought my own copy of it with my own money once, back when I hardly had any money of my own. (Not that I do these days either. :p) But for some reason, I never tried to find the rest of them to read. That will change soon, though. I found the entire series available for download on Kindle, for only about $12, and I bought it immediately. I plan to have the whole thing read by the time Oz: The Great and Powerful is released.

The Hunger Games: A Book Review

I normally never like what is "Popular" in Tween culture. Twilight, Harry Potter, zombie anything, all of these have never appealed to me, yet they are inexplicably, wildly popular with Teens and tweens all over the country. I figured that the Hunger games was just another fad that I would ignore. And I did for awhile.

Thinking back, I actually remember when the first book came out. I found it at the library, picked it up and read the description. It did hold my interest, but I was getting to the point where work was taking over my life, and I had pretty much stopped reading, so I set it down. I found it a couple more times over the next couple of years and briefly considered it each time, because there was something about the story that was compelling, despite the horrific-seeming plot.

In the future, North America has fallen apart. There are no countries, only 12 districts, ruled by a totalitarian president, who forces 2 teenagers from each district to compete in "The Hunger Games" A gladiator-like fight to the death on live television for the entertainment of "The Capitol" the city in which the elite class and the president live in luxury. The games keep the population under his control, as the games serve as a reminder of what happens to those who rebel. There used to be 13 districts, but district 13 had been blown off the map after rebelling 74 years earlier.

This is not the sort of thing I like to read, yet something kept drawing me to it. Ultimately I never read them back then. Like I said, I pretty much stopped reading once I started working, which is really sad actually, because I used to be a voracious reader. I'd bring home stacks of books from the library and plow through them in a week, and then bring them back and restock. I am going to try to get back into that habit, albeit on a much more manageable scale. I can't imaging I'll ever have the time I used to have as a kid. I was sick a lot and I had PLENTY of time to read. These days I've outgrown the sickness, and I work way too much to go through a book a day.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand, a few months ago I started hearing about the Hunger Games again. At first I didn't connect them to the books I'd found a few years ago. I only heard the "Fight to the death" stuff, and I was turned off instantly. I've been in a bit of a funk these last few years and I've tried to keep my entertainment much lighter. Then, thanks to Facebook, I found out that many of my friends and family were starting to read them, and I was hearing glowing reviews, so I started considering reading them myself. I'm not sure when I realized that this was the same series I'd seen at the library a few years before, but when I did I pretty much decided I needed to just read them already.

I have an Amazon Kindle, so after receiving a notification that the Hunger Games trilogy was available for borrowing through Amazon Prime, I decided to go for it. It was free, and if I hated it I wouldn't be out anything. I did not hate it. I loved the first book, and I loved the second, Catching Fire, even more than the first. And while I can't say that I loved Mockingjay, the final book, in the same way that I loved the other two, I can say that I don't think I'd want the story to have ended any other way.

The books center around a girl named Katniss Everdeen, who volunteers to take her little sister's place in the Hunger Games. As most will guess since she is the main character, she wins the games, but by winning the 74th annual Hunger Games, Katniss unintentionally sparks a rebellion, out of which a war begins during the 75th annual Hunger Games. Katniss becomes the most important "Player" that the rebels have in their fight against The Capitol.

It could have been a very tragic end. Well, really it was tragic. So many characters died by the end of the series. So many changed for the worse, including the main character, though through the epilogue it becomes more bittersweet, showing that even though horrific things happen, it won't stay that way forever and time will heal all wounds; not completely heal them, as though they never happened, but at least ease the pain.

To me the story is not only about the dangers of "Big Government", but also about the evils of war, and what one has to become in order to win a war, even a war that is necessary for freedom. There could be no sunshine and lollipops end to a series like this. Had it been a "Happily-Ever-After" type story it would have completely dulled the point that the author was trying to make, and would have felt forced and fake. The end felt so much more real than an "Everybody lived and nothing bad ever happened again" end.

Even though I almost never buy movies without watching them first, I pre-ordered The Hunger Games movie. From what I've read, the author was directly involved in the screenplay, and the movie was incredibly faithful to the book. Of course the violence had to be minimized to attain a PG-13 rating, but I am glad for that. Some of what happened during the books, I just do not want to see on screen, and I am still a bit skeptical of how they are going to continue to get PG-13 ratings for the rest of the films, especially on the final movie. If the movie is even half as good as the book, I will love it.

To sum up my review of the series: Read the Hunger Games. You won't regret it. You will be sucked in, and you won't be able to put them down. You might even shed a tear by the end. More than once. (I admit nothing.) :p

Creature and Bird

I wrote this post for a blog I abandoned, but I needed to link to it for my Beanie Baby post, so I decided to go find it and repost it here. When I went to find it, I noticed that the original post date on the other blog was EXACTLY one year ago today on May 1st 2011. Talk about a weird coincidence...
I wrote this post because I was trying to "Be a blogger" and I was using a suggestion from another blog to write about the last good book I had read. Ultimately I decided not to "Be a Blogger" and just go back to writing about my life. Here is the (mostly) original Post. I have edited it somewhat, and added a few more pictures.

The last good book I read was actually two books, and it was more looking at the pictures than it was reading. The books are entitled Creature, and Bird, by photographer Andrew Zuckerman. They are amazing books. The pictures are absolutely stunning.

Andrew Zuckerman photographs his subjects against a completely white background. This does two things, first of all it allows you to focus on the animal itself, as there is nothing distracting going on around the creature. The white background also reflects the light in such a way that every detail of the animal becomes crystal clear. It reveals so much detail that you otherwise would never see. Some of them are almost mesmerizing. I could look at the parrots for hours, their feathers are so beautiful.

 

I wholeheartedly recommend these books to any animal lover, bird lover, or photography enthusiast. These are two picture books that you won’t want to just flip through. You’ll want to linger over every page, soaking in all of the amazing details.

To see some more of Andrew Zuckerman’s work you can click the link to his website, HERE.
He has also set up separate sites for both books. You can find Creature HERE and Bird HERE.