Attractions for the Awesome Tourist!

     So on my last trip around the world .... just kidding. I haven't left the country in 2 years! I went to Peru almost 3 years ago and that's it! However, I do have some experience daydreaming and looking up different countries so that I can daydream affectively (lol nerd alert!) and I have found some very cool tourist sites! I have also found some very unusual ones too.... but anyway, I think tourist attractions are fun to look into and that's why this post is all about these said tid-bits of awesome.... I have looked into so many and found that I don't think I can fit all of them into this tiny little blog post so perhaps I will have to do a part 2 to this here post! (lol) Anyways, here is a rather long list of interesting and some funky tourist attractions:

• Cancún’s Underwater Museum, Mexico: The world’s largest underwater museum opened three miles offshore in November 2010 with hundreds of sunken life-size human figures. Artist Jason deCaires Taylor used pH-neutral concrete to create these sculptures, which double as a home for peacock flounder, white telestra coral, and other aquatic life that have becoming increasingly threatened by the 750,000-plus annual divers who visit the National Marine Park’s coral reefs. It really is rather quite amazing to look at!
  Capital Gate, Abu Dhabi: Dubai typically hogs the limelight with its ambitious projects, but now Abu Dhabi is defying gravity with this glassy 35-story landmark—the world’s furthest-leaning man-made tower. The glinting 18-degree tilt (four times more than that of Pisa’s leaning tower) catches your eye among the city’s jumble of skyscrapers and cranes. You can’t miss it on the drive to the Grand Mosque, but to get a peek inside, book a stay at the Hyatt Hotel slated to open in mid-to-late 2011.
• Cheetah Hunt Roller Coaster, Busch Gardens, Tampa, Florida: Theme parks invested heavily in new attractions during the recession’s staycation trend, and 2011 sees fruits of those efforts. No new ride has more daredevil spirit than the Cheetah Hunt: a multilaunch coaster that jettisons riders from 0 to 60 mph, corkscrews up 100 feet into a skyscraping figure eight, narrowly grazing over the cable lines for the Skyride, and clips a waterfall before plummet-torqueing into a trench in the park’s Serengeti area. Can we do it again, please?
• Metropol Parasol, Seville, Spain: If you want to know what Alice felt like in Wonderland, head to Seville, where a trippy new pavilion has sprung up in the Plaza de la Encarnacíon. Undulating blonde timber structures with a honeycomb roof make up the world’s largest wooden building, known by locals as “Setas de la Encarnación,” or the Mushrooms of Incarnation. It’s home to an archaeological museum, a farmers’ market, and an elevated plaza with bars and restaurants.
• 11 11 Lincoln Road Parking Garage, Miami: Car culture gets the starchitect treatment at this garage. The modernist open-air structure designed by Swiss firm Herzog & de Meuron opened in 2010 and has become a hot spot for events, while hip shops and restaurants like Danny Meyer’s Shake Shack draw daytime crowds. Developer Robert Wennett refers to the trapezoidal house of cards as a “parking sculpture,” complete with an adjacent water garden and a Dan Graham–designed glass pavilion. The mixed-use venue was a winner of the 2011 T+L Design Awards.
• Orbit Tower, London: Imagine the Eiffel Tower on acid or a roller coaster that’s survived a hurricane. These are the kinds of images that London’s twisted, blood-red, 377-foot-high sculpture brings to mind. Artists Anish Kapoor and Cecil Balmond collaborated on the controversial skyline addition, which is being designed for the 2012 Summer Olympics. The tubular steel tower will feature a platform nested at the midway point and become London’s latest must-see attraction when completed in December 2011.
• Brooklyn Bridge Park, New York City: There’s a new reward for walking across the Brooklyn Bridge: this necklace of six leafy plots that stretches along the waterfront between the neighborhoods of DUMBO and Cobble Hill. The initial two segments opened in spring 2010 and were heralded as Mayor Bloomberg’s most important legacy by the New York Times architecture critic. An expansion of Pier 6 debuts this summer along with a restored 1920s carousel in a pavilion designed by Jean Nouvel. Time your visit to catch the sunset over the Statue of Liberty, then linger to witness Manhattan light up at night.
• Nanjing Sifang Art Museum, Nanjing, China: Not many people are familiar with Nanjing, whose population of 7.7 million somehow ranks as “small” by Chinese city terms. But that’s beginning to change as the local art scene outpaces that of Beijing and Shanghai and welcomes a high-profile museum of contemporary architecture. Several years in the making, the Nanjing Sifang Art Museum rises from the quiet, shaggy hills of the Jiangsu like a postmodern Star Wars vehicle. U.S. architect Steven Holl collaborated with international architects on the abstract, stilt-supported design and factored in eco-friendly features like a green roof and a geothermal heating and cooling system.

        *Pics are in order

So being the nerd that I am, I often find myself reading a lot of books. I love reading, and I can just never seem to get enough! I may be what you call a bibliophile: a person who loves or collects books, especially as examples of fine or unusual printing, binding, or the like. So naturally when I write papers or things of that nature, I always refer to dictionary.reference.com for any and all misspellings. After having done this for years now, I finally realized that there was this tool/tab that let me see approxiamtely how many words I knew! Naturally I was ecstatic. So I tried it out and here's what I found out: at 19 years of age Iknow approximately 42,083 words total!! How cool is that?!

     Now I know what y'all might be thinking, "Wow, this chick's a total word whiz and a flat out NERD!!" And you'd all be correct. But this isn't the part that makes me think this is awesome, no the awesome part in my opinion is that it got me thinking about funky words. So here's a list I have compiled of words not often found in one's repertoire of knowledge, and let's see how many you know!!

• Affable
• Assuage
• Austere
• Burnish
• Dearth
• Ebullient
• Garrulous
• Hyperbole
• Irascible
• Mitigate
• Nomenclature
• Phlegmatic
• Plethora
• Quixotic
• Ribald
• Taciturn
• Urbane

Words: Every Lexicologists Dream

     So being the nerd that I am, I often find myself reading a lot of books. I love reading, and I can just never seem to get enough! I may be what you call a bibliophile: a person who loves or collects books, especially as examples of fine or unusual printing, binding, or the like. So naturally when I write papers or things of that nature, I always refer to dictionary.reference.com for any and all misspellings. After having done this for years now, I finally realized that there was this tool/tab that let me see approxiamtely how many words I knew! Naturally I was ecstatic. So I tried it out and here's what I found out: at 19 years of age Iknow approximately 42,083 words total!! How cool is that?!

     Now I know what y'all might be thinking, "Wow, this chick's a total word whiz and a flat out NERD!!" And you'd all be correct. But this isn't the part that makes me think this is awesome, no the awesome part in my opinion is that it got me thinking about funky words. So here's a list I have compiled of words not often found in one's repertoire of knowledge, and let's see how many you know!!

• Affable
• Assuage
• Austere
• Burnish
• Dearth
  
• Hyperbole


• Irascible


• Mitigate


• Nomenclature


• Phlegmatic



• Plethora


• Quixotic


• Ribald



• Taciturn


• Urbane


• Ebullient
• Garrulous

Let's Talk Bands With Amazing Names!!

     Okay, have any of you guys saw, heard, or read a band's name and thought, "Wow! That's such a cool name! It's so unique." Well, when I hear bands like that I always want to find out about how they got their name. I'm really a nerd so it should be no surprise to any of you that I do in fact enjoy researching, horrific I know! lol But in all seriousness, here are a few names of some bands that you may never have heard of, and some bands you may have heard of, that fall under the umbrella of 'Unique': here are their stories....

• Heyhihello!- This band of five hottie boys came together a little while back. Though the members now are not the originals, for the most part they have not changed their style. The actual name of the band came from the lead singer's dad. His dad use to say "Hey, hi, hello" when he answered the phone or met his friends.... and the name just stuck to them like Gorilla glue to....well.... anything! lol

• Owl City has been propelled into the fame spotlight by funky synthezied pop songs like "Fireflies", "Hello Seattle", and "Galaxies" just to name a few.  Owl City is really a one-man-band headed by one Adam Young. He has let his Christian (yay) faith influence his music and is from Owatana, MN. This is why he called his project band Owl City and has never looked back!

• Family Force 5 is perhaps a very well known Christian band that does not sound at all like any normal quote-un-quote Christian band many have heard through the years. This band of 3 family members and 2 others have took the world by storm for their most noted style of presenting the gospel. They are an all-rock-crunk band with a heavy apetite for screaming, singing and loud instuments. Their stage performance has been said to be "Off the hook crazy!" and their songs have been labeled "Christian genius!" Their name came about as a change from their original band name The Phamily. They were told that due to copyright issues with Prince's band name The Family they needed to change it, Family Force 5 came about and they've loved it ever since!

• Last but not least, Franki Valli and the Four Seasons. Wow, this all-american man band was the most popular band before the Beatles. The name was changed from The Four Lovers the The Four Seasons and Franki bought them out and they put his name on front! Not much to tell about these amazing singers, only that they played and sang everything under the sun! These guys really are Hall of Fame material as they were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990 which later joined with the Vocal Group Hall of Fame 9 years later in 1999. Franki Valli still lives and is touring too!! I think he needs to slow down a little though.... lol :D

     So tell me what other bands you found with crazy or unique names! I'd love to read about them, just drop a comment and leave you name so I can check you out.... wow that sounded a little immature sorry! lol Anyways comment and stuff and I'll post all y'all later!! PEACE! (my ghetto fail!)

Here's The Skinny

     So bloggers, this is my first attempt at a real, honest-to-goodness blog so bear with me! I have always loved the idea of having a blog and for the most part always thought they were super difficult to maintain. However, a few movies and friends said that I might be able to keep it up if I really tried.... so here we are!!

     I am a crazy girl who is definitely a hopless romantic. This blog is my way of getting the word out about cool stuff like obscure bands, little-known-about books, movies by unknown directors (but still amazingly good!!) and the like. So be prepared bloggers! I am ruthless in my pursuit for the perfect post, so I will try often and practice even more! lol Thanks for being understanding of my naivete and all that, and I look forward to conversing and chit-chatting with you soon!!