Alt Groove Recap 4.25 - Jahkeem from (S)ecrets Interview!

*Featured track: "All Night All Day" by (S)ecrets*

I had the chance today to interview Jahkeem from the band (S)ecrets, the official "pop ensemble" on campus. They have been together for a couple of semesters and preparing for a show this coming Monday. (S)ecrets recently released an album titled (S)ecrets: On the DL. There are nine people in the band and they all collaborate with all sorts of influences to make this awesome pop/hip hop sound.

Click here for the audio from the interview!

L O C A L :

• Free Yoga for earth day rescheduled for monday 12pm - 2pm
• Keith Haring exhibit of his earlier work at the Brooklyn Museum till July 8th
• You should go to the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens!
• (S)ecrets LIVE in the quad @ 1pm, then again @ 7:30 pm at the Garner Recital Hall

TTFN! <3

Reuse Those Glass bottles for Your Tea! - Quick DIY

'Tis the season for cool refreshing drinks! My personal favorite is Iced Tea. It can get expensive really quick buying cans or even gallons of Arizona or Honest Tea, but tea bags? Not so much. When I do buy bottled tea, I try to stick with glass bottles so I can reuse them with my own tea!

You will need....

• Glass bottles (Honest, Tazo, and Snapple use glass instead of plastic in most cases)
• Your favorite tea
• Your favorite tea fixins

1. Drink the tea you bought at your leisure. sip, ahhhhhh. Remove label from the bottle and wash it out. I find a paste made from baking soda helps remove the sticky goo left behind by the label. 
2. Use the bottle to measure out how much water you want to boil for your tea. In this case I had two bottles to fill, so I used the bottle to transfer water from sink to pot (twice). Then add about half a bottle more since some water will evaporate.
3. Use twice as many tea bags as you would for hot tea. I decided to go for pomegranate green tea today.
4. When your tea has steeped for the appropriate amount of time, stir in your fixins while it's still hot  so things like sugar have a chance to melt into the drink rather than sink to the bottom. I used three teaspoons for this batch.
5. You can wait for the tea to cool down if you'd like, but I usually just pour it right in at this point.
6. Chill in the fridge for a few hours, and enjoy whenever you like!

I find this particularly great for getting ready for school. I make a batch of 5 or 6 bottles sunday night and it's ready to grab and go throughout the week since I'm always on the move. Let me know if you try this out! And what are some of your favorite teas?

TTFN!

-Avé Renée

Brooklyn Botanical Gardens | Brooklyn Museum - Field Trip!

Yesterday the SCSU Student Arts League went to the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens and the Brooklyn Museum. For my first time in Brooklyn, this trip was perfect.

The botanical gardens was honestly the most relaxing and inspiring venture I've been on in quite some time. The conservatory included exotic plants from tropical, desert, and warmer climates; where I drew the most inspiration from. The textures and shapes in some of these plants were hard to ignore. I can't wait to incorporate it in my sculptures next semester! My favorite part was the Cherry Walk. There were two rows of the most beautiful cherry blossom trees I've ever seen. The weather was gorgeous--a slight breeze...toes between the grass...sun shining....ahh! So great. 

Between the garden and the Brooklyn Museum, my friend and I wanted to find a bite to eat. We walked a couple of blocks past the library to stumble across a farmer's market. I was NOT leaving the market till I had a cup of fresh apple cider :3. There were also a couple of venders selling tees, jewelry, and hand made totes. I fell in love with a pair of $65 earrings but sadly I couldn't afford to impulse buy, le sighh. 

The Brooklyn Museum was super great from what I saw. I only had enough time to wander on the fourth and fifth floor. I'm not the greatest museum buddy; I tend to wander around without a map and without a mission. However, I'm glad I saw two particular exhibits: The Dinner Party by Judy Chicago and Keith Haring: 1978 - 1982. Haring is one of my most favorite artists, so to see some of his early work was amazing.

The Matrix by Keith Haring in the Brooklyn Museum

Afterwards we had dinner at The Pour and caught the last couple of innings of the Yankee game (I'm not one for baseball, but it was a pretty good game!) I treated myself to a turkey burger complete with avocado slices and tatertots. Yes. Tatertots. Best tatertots I've ever had (Napoleon Dynomite would be proud). We made our final stop at The Strand. Our advisor described it as if "you were to open up your laptop, and walk into the book section of Amazon.com." It was a pretty accurate description. There's four floors, one of which is dedicated to just art books. Used, new, rare, cheap--all awesome. I will definitely make a trip back to The Strand with money and time to spend. It was a perfect ending to well overdue field trip. I've been a college student for four years a while and have yet to go on a field trip; I need to take advantage of what my tuition is going towards!

Alt Groove Recap - 4.18 - Tuna Scrape, what?

P L A Y L I S T :

F A S H I O N :

This has been the week of flowy dresses on campus all week! Larger patterns in style, I can dig it. I'm also diggin' the availability of canvas shoes this season. I plan on dying and designing a pair for myself, so hopefully you'll get a chance to see it. Lastly, a trend I'm seeing on campus for both boys and girls are deconstructed denim vests; it's a great way to express and personalize your style--great for everyone!

T O P I C S :

• The Needle Drop came by and talked about his career as a music critic via his vlog, blog, and radio show. It was awesome! Check out my full review of the event here.
• The media studies club hosted a showing of The Purity Myth. This film showcases the inequality between men and women when it comes to sex and virginity. Lately, government agencies, schools, and the media want to see a return to gender rolls circa 1950 and have been placing a huge importance on women's virginity. It lead to great discussion; I made sure to point out to the men in the room that this view of women adds yet another layer of challenge that women face in everyday life that men never have to worry about. The film also shows people in favor of this movement towards virginity opposing feminists. The most shocking part was the women who were against feminism--REALLY? Feminism is the support of equality between the sexes. When women are still being paid 20 cents less than men across the board, I don't know how any woman could be against it. Other points were made, like not every christian or republican thinks like this and how the crazy few make the rest look bad to the public. I think the most important part of this event was showing how crucial it is to vote so Romney people who think like this aren't elected into office.
• While scrolling through my twitter feed, I came across NPR's tweet that jeopardized my love for spicy tuna rolls. Apparently there's a growing concern about the safety of raw fish because of something they call "tuna scrape," which is the meat closest to the bones. Say it ain't so! Read more about it here. 

Internet's Busiest Music Nerd...On Campus!

Today I had the pleasure of meeting Anthony Fantano of the b/vlog, The Needle Drop. WSIN radio, where he got his start, hosted the event. If you haven't heard of or seen it yet, The Needle Drop reviews music from all sorts of genres focusing on those of the "independent persuasion."

We talked about how he started, how he makes a living, advice for future media entrepreneurs, music stuff, etc etc... It was slightly surreal to meet a youtuber I'm so used to seeing on my computer screen, but it was really awesome! He was super nice and helpful, just what I needed as I'm kicking this hobby into high gear :).

There were two little gems of info that I gained from this Q&A session (three if you include the birth of Cal Chuchesta):

1. Post content consistently, using all social media sites to your advantage. He used a rapper by the name of Little B (Lil' B?) as an example. He's certainly not the greatest rapper (to say the least), but he's constantly uploading mix tapes, music videos, and posting on twitter--so much that it leaves little room to breath and consume it all; but it's effective.
2. As long as you provide an original perspective on a topic you love, people will come back and might even follow. This is especially true if you share content with others that they may not have learned otherwise.  It also helps if it's content that people would want to share.

There were a bunch of other things like how he handles his diverse fan base and requests, where does his income come from with advertisements, and more businessy type things, but I'm not quite there yet :P Still, super cool to meet him and learn behind the scenes things about a young, successful entrepreneur. Hope to see him again sometime!

Greek Easter!

So last week was the Easter I  normally celebrate, and this week was the Greek Orthodox Easter (fiancé's greek, so I'm looking at two easters every year :3) There was lamb and feta and orzo and spanakopita and it was all just so delicious; but that's besides the point. I wanted to take a quick picture of the painting I did for fiancé's yia yia's 90th birthday-- A lovely watercolor of santorini. I've done one a little different than this one here, but this one came out way better. Eventually I'll photograph it properly....but yeah! for my first painting of the year I think I did alright :) Oh yeah and Moose got to enjoy the lamb bone.

Alt Groove Recap! 4.11.12

P L A Y L I S T :

• "11th Dimension" by Julian Casablancas
• "Don't Stop Me Now" by Queen
• "Higher Ground" by Red Hot Chili Peppers
• "Joy Ride" by The Killers
• "Punching in a Dream" by The Naked and Famous
• "Cosmic Girl" by Jamiroquai
• "Lollipop" by MIKA
• "Sins of My Youth" by Neon Trees
• "Take on Me" by A-Ha
• "Steady as She Goes" by The Raconteurs

F A S H I O N : 

Check out hautelook.com for great deals (50% - 75% off, whaaaat?!)  on designer brand clothes for men, kids, and women! they have home goods, tech goodies, and all sort of things.

L O C A L :

• Buzzathon today! Akira will be performing around noon!
• Purity Myth screening in Hickerson April 17th, 7 to 9. I'll be on the panel discussion. Check out the trailer!
• Anthony Fantano of The Needle Drop will be talking about his experience in professional radio. *swoon* Monday April 16th in the student center theater.

T O P I C S :

• Jenna Talackova will be allowed to participate in Miss Universe! She was born a man, but believe me when I say she's all woman. Congrats, girl!
• 8.6 magnitude earthquake in the Indian Ocean; all surrounding areas are on tsunami watch. Lets send our thoughts and prayers their way.
• Ashton Kutcher rumored to play Steve Jobs in an indie film. what.
• Schools in Brazil are putting locator chips in students' uniforms to help track tardiness and text parents. Do you think technology is going a bit to far here or is it just something bound to happen?
• An elderly gentleman fell as he was getting out of the car and was stuck in the street. Two good samaritans helped him up and carried his groceries into his home. This was on my way home last night; although I didn't see him fall, I drove up to the scene as the girl got out of her car to help him up. Good people still exist in the world!

Whilst I wait for my ceramics class to start

Last Thursday was the last day of wet clay. All of the ceramics students were frantically working on our finals before the dreaded 7 o'clock came around. It. Was. Tense.

So now everything is in the process of getting fired and this lovely whale mug was one of my first projects. I'm so glad he survived the kiln! He may not be the greatest whale mug ever made, but he's all MINE.

Today's the first day of glazing and I couldn't be happier with the projects I ended up with.

Makin' the Move!

As I perused the interweb this morning, I checked out a couple of blogs, posts, DIY thangs, etc etc...and i came to a realization. I'm jealous of how other people's blogs look! I'm talking about the semi pros out there, which is something I hope to be. After much investigation I decided to try out Blogger once more. I was previously using Weebly, but I started to blog much more often and Weebly is primarily for starting websites, not blogs.

So over the next few days I'll be making the switch. As you can see I already started importing some older posts from blogs past (i only took a couple of posts from my previous blogger blog, then deleted it.) I'm not sure If I'll be transferring all of the post from Weebly, or if I'll make this my primary site, or a combination of the two; only time will tell!

I gotta be honest though, these different fonts from different blogs thing is killin' me!

TTFN!
ps. the kid behind me has a naruto badge on his hat, whaaat?

Alt Groove 4.4.12 recap! - Mike Nice

P L A Y L I S T :

• "Two Weeks" by Grizzly Bears
• "Damn" by Dom
• "Harder Better Faster Stronger" by Daft Punk
• "Shake a fist" by Hot Chip
• "Soul Meets Body" by Death Cab for Cutie
• "Something is not Right With Me" by Cold War Kids
• "Crown on the Ground" by Sleigh Bells
• "Bangers and Mash" by Radiohead
• "Junior Kick Start" by The GO! Team

Mike Nice is a talk show host of his very own show, Mike Nice Talk of the Talk. He has had a variety of guests ranging from the governor, to student athletes, to Nobel Peace Prize winners. He's very active in the community and connects his audience with other individuals in the community. He got his start during his senior year of high school and has been driven ever since he was a kid to make it as a talk show host. How many people can say they've had their own show since high school?

I got the chance to talk with him about how he got his start, how he runs his show, and some fun facts about the man himself. Mike is a truly diverse and open minded individual. He's making his dreams a reality. I think that's what I love about him the most.

His show airs (for the locals) on channel 27 CTV, in New Haven, West Haven, and Hamden. But of course everyone can check out clips of his show atwww.mikeniceshow.com.

He originally approached me as I was ending my show a couple of weeks ago to ask if he could be on my show and this really was a great experience as my first guest on air. I'm sure you'll hear him on my show again in the future!

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