Pope Jon wrote:
When I was a wee lad, I remember playing a demo that came with some other game I owned on the computer. The demo was for a game called "Future Cop: L.A.P.D." The game consisted of you, the future cop, gunning your way through loads of bad guys in a lethal robot-like tank.
"To serve and protect," right?
Despite it being just a demo, I played that game constantly, and decided that I wanted to be cop. Because in the mind of a child, driving around in a sweet-looking robot tank and blowing up turrets, buildings, and people seems like an ideal career path.
So as I got older, people would ask me what I wanted to be when I grew up, right after noticing how much I'd grown. I would instinctively say "A cop!" They would simply be impressed and find my determination to shoot bad guys adorable at a younger age, but as I got older I began to realize that I needed to justify my wanting to shoot the bad guys by acting like that wasn't the plan. So I started to figure out what real police officers did and would incorporate the serious tone that seemed to make everyone nod in approval.
Eventually people stopped asking me that, and instead questioned why my nails were black and why my hair was so long, and didn't seem to want to know what my aspirations were anymore. Which was good in a sense, because I didn't have a clue.
Chuck C. wrote:
My life goals were an oscillating topic in my youth. As with any young one I went through my fireman phase, my police officer phase (the libertarian in me still looks upon this time as “the dark times”), and my army man phase. The phase though that has been most consistent in my life is my desire to be a author. Even in my elementary years I wanted to be a writer. I was always stealing paper from the class supply and writing out stories although that has back burner-ed several times in my life, I know it’s my calling. I cannot imagine myself doing anything else with my life. This blog, and the novels and short stories I am currently working on are my means to get my writing career going. Although my day job is the certainly not writing or authoring, its providing me the shelter and food that my body requires to effectively produce authorial genius (and humility as well).
Prompt: Explain the deep philosophical meaning behind this painting.
Dana Lee wrote:
This painting represents the hunger in the world. There are often times where food is in reach yet we cannot obtain it. There are several factors that prevent us from having everything we need in order to survive. In this painting you see an animal just staring at a sandwich. Yet, he does not seem able to eat the sandwich. The sandwich is also glowing and seems to be radiating. This make it seem as if the animal almost worships the sandwich for what is is worth.
Dan Christmann wrote:
Obviously the painting is a classic Derridian critique of traditional platonic metaphysics where, as we see (say in the Symposium), form is connected to a thing’s essence, or being itself, without its context or specificity. This essence is often visually represented as an ideal version of the thing. Being is what appearance (I.E. us) imitates. The painting, however, enacts a blurring of being, or an estrangement of it by placing ideal images, like one of a gigantic cheese sandwich, in a widely unfamiliar context. Likewise with the rooster-zebra. Both animals in their natural form are familiar to us, but when grafted together they become something that we have no name for. This begs the question whether this grafting creates a new being? Or if, in Plato’s normal circumstances, this is simply a matter of appearance or context, which he generally ignores? To me, this painting seeks to fracture the idea, or at least call on it to account for itself. Because here we are shown that context changes our understanding of a specific object in the painting. Therefore, at least visually, each object’s appearance is a part of its context and as such there can be no single essence disconnected from the others and Plato’s system seems to dissolve into a chaotic series of experiences, one after another, which have no coherent meaning or point.
Also, honestly, the whole thing is just a bit silly, isn’t it? Everyone knows the rooster-zebra prefers an aquatic environment, and won’t go anywhere near grilled cheese.
Prompt: What is your favorite smell? Describe it in details and explain why it is your favorite.
Melody Joy wrote:
My favorite smell is manure. Specifically of the goat and horse variety. It smells gloriously of hay, grass, and grains that have been naturally processed to perfection. It smells wonderfully like hay, grass, and grains ready to return to the earth as fertilizer to strengthen the next generation of plants. It smells spectacularly of farms, animals, and nature working the way God intended it.
I love it not only because it’s so sweet and earthy, but also because of the memories it stirs. It always reminds me of the times I visited my grandparents’ farm in Oregon as a child and it reminds me now of the years I spent working in the barn at a summer camp. I love working with animals and I love working hard with my hands, and manure reminds me of that and makes me feel like I’m right at home.
Chuck C. wrote:
My favorite smell, without equivocation, without qualification, is the smell of grilling meat. The smell of caramelizing animal flesh just...stirs my loins. It invigorates me, it engenders and the immediate reaction in me is to seek out its source and consume it. The warm, smoky, thick fragrance of the once functional muscles being burnt, is quite simply the best smell in God’s creation. Is quinoa lower in fat? Yes. Does humus provide you a complete protein? Sure, but nothing can ever beat the smell of a large hunk of animal meeting the searing heat of hot coals.
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