Category: What’s Entertaining

There’s this place next to the Ogden 6 Movie Theater called Slot Car Raceway. 

From afar, it kind of looks like a storefront for a mafia safehouse, but when you take a closer look, the entire space is filled with slot car race tracks–mazes of metal, plastic, and wood that loop over and under, inside and out. Less sketchy, but it’s definitely not somewhere you’d want to take someone on a first date to. 

A while ago, I paid a visit to Slot Car Raceway to buy electric motors for a hovercraft I was building. As I walked in, the middle-aged man smoking outside quickly stamped out his cigarette and followed me in. He introduced himself as the owner, and offered to help. Speaking to him, I learned that slot car racing, though a niche hobby, has a good number of participants around the country. Basically people assemble lightweight plastic vehicles, strap high powered electric motors on them, and race them around the tracks at up to 100 mph! So yeah, low key interesting. I ended up buying some high rpm motors from the guy, but I couldn’t help feeling that slot cars weren’t the only “goods” they were selling there. 

Despite my suspicions, I gained some new respect for that guy and his store. He fell in love with a hobby enough to turn it into a business. It also got me thinking about how having a hobby is stereotyped to be a midlife crisis activity–the name “slot car racing” exudes late 40’s balding men gathered over soldering irons trying to put the finishing touches on their precision engineered slot car before the regional open championships. From my perspective, hobbies don’t come with age restrictions–there’s no reason why a teenage girl should shy away from something like woodworking because it’s “something old men do”. 

Personally, I’ve always considered myself a hobbyist–there’s not a lot that I won’t consider trying.

The first real hobby I had was photography. Back in fifth grade, my mom got tired of seeing me sitting around watching youtube every weekend, so she handed me a camera and an instructional booklet for me to peruse. Initially, my idea of photography involved walking around the neighborhood with my dad’s fancy DSLR on “auto” mode, snapping pictures of plants, and calling it nature photography. Basically, that’s the equivalent of buying a Mac and only using it to watch Netflix. 

Eventually, I learned how to properly use the camera, and was able to experiment and capture some pretty cool images. I used slow shutter speeds to create light paintings, rigged up water to drip so I could capture the moment a droplet splashed down, and dropped strawberries into an old fish tank to visualize the trails they made through the water. 

Ultimately, my photography skills never really excelled beyond the point of snapping Shutterstock stock photos, but I think the fun I had doing it helped inspire my passion for my next hobby: aquascaping.

While “fishkeeping” conjures up memories of upturned carnival goldfish, aquascaping takes a more refined approach to the hobby–natural elements, artistic composition, and water chemistry. My aquascaping phase started with a simple betta tank, but soon escalated to a 5-gallon planted tank decorated with driftwood, rocks, live plants, and five beautiful golden white mountain minnows. 

I loved the research, details, and care that went into aquascaping, such as the Japanese rules of aquarium composition, which dictated that odd numbers of rocks should be positioned to create the most natural appearance. I studied water chemistry, filtration, and lighting, allowing my minnows to thrive for over two years. Aquascaping proved pretty expensive for my middle school allowance, so it was unsustainable in the long run. I’ll definitely come back to it in the future, though.

Together, photography and aquascaping helped develop the attention to detail and creativity necessary for me to pursue oil-painting, a more technically demanding hobby.

The summer before my sophomore year, I had nothing better to do, so I dove into oil painting. It was then I learned about dynamic composition, which replaced the rule of thirds as a superior way to arrange the subjects within a painting. After getting familiar with the methods of Bob Ross, I quickly realized there was so much more to oil painting than just freehanded landscapes. I absorbed video after video on youtube to learn new techniques, and even checked out painting books at the library. My obsession with painting probably contributed to my nickname “grandpa Neil”, which a few friends called me back then. 

At the end of the summer, I produced two original seascapes that I think are some of my most beautiful works. 

Later, I began to diversify my pallette, painting this cityscape of New York that won a Gold Key at the Scholastic Art and Writing Competition. 

I also completed this mural for Mr. Farrell, who wanted me to paint one because he’s also into painting (which doesn’t really help the “grandpa Neil” stereotype).

 

Presently, I haven’t been able to paint as much as I’d like. My summers have been pretty busy, and honestly, I fear that I’m a little out of practice. Hopefully, I’ll have time this summer to wrap up a few paintings I never finished.

 

These last two hobbies already have separate blogs devoted to them here and here, but long story short, I got obsessed with woodworking and 3D printing this summer. 

I started woodworking on a whim in mid July, and it led to me joining North’s woodworking club (which has a total of five members) last fall. I’m not great with chisels yet, but I’ve made some simple wall and room decor for friends and teachers. 

I took on 3D printing as a hobby after my music capstone project involved using 3D printing to create custom saxophone mouthpieces. I got my hands on a 3D printer for free after my computer science partner, Josh, who happens to be a 3D printing guru, found one on the side of the road and gave it to me. But anyways, I’ll be attending the Midwest RepRap festival, the largest 3D printing conference in the Midwest, this spring with Josh. 

In all my years of being a hobbyist, it’s often been hard to find a larger community that shares my passions. However, when I do meet someone, we almost always become good friends. Having a hobby is far more than something one might do to justify their existence–it’s exploration, networking, an exercise in problem solving and neuroplasticity. So I urge you, no matter how niche you think a hobby is, just give it a shot. I can guarantee there’s so much more to it than you ever thought possible.

It’s a known fact: basketball and sneakers go hand in hand–or rather foot in foot.

Long before you even see the court, you can hear the crispy sounds of spit-slathered Nikes tearing up the hardwood. To ballers and sneakerheads alike, basketball shoes are more than sports equipment. They’re fashion statements, wearable art. They send a message. Aside from pure ability, they’re one of the only ways a player can differentiate themselves. 

The symbiotic relationship between basketball and sneakers has resulted in generation after generation of sneakerheads, each bringing with them new tastes, materials, colors, and technology. If we look carefully, this contrasting interaction between fashion and athletics has not limited itself to basketball. 

In football, the same trend has proliferated in terms of uniform. 

Take a look at this progression:

In track and running, sneaker culture is burgeoning in a similar fashion as basketball shoes.

But of course, baseball, a sport that is already struggling to gain popularity, decides to center its sports-fashion fusion culture around the humble leather glove.

Though a vital component of the game, the baseball glove provides little practical or stylistic function beyond the diamond. Like could you imagine:

Yet among players, the glove represents a metaphysical extension of their body, a sense of true connection to the game. In this blog, I will attempt to analyze baseball glove culture: what made me and many others so obsessed with them, the finest specimens, the latest styles and trends, and the unwritten rules surrounding this sports-fashion subculture.

My first baseball glove was a kid-sized mitt my mom bought me for tee-ball. It has since been lost to the depths of my basement, but that tiny, faux-leather excuse for a glove started my twelve year long baseball journey and incited a lifelong obsession for the sport. 

My current glove is one that I’ve had for years. It’s kind of floppy, and I need to get a new one soon, but I’ve used it every season of high school baseball and I’ll admit, I’m a little attached to it. This brings us to my current situation: trying to find a replacement ball-glove.

 

Like any well-informed consumer, I did my research, and unknowingly became immersed within a dynamic, ceaselessly evolving side of the sport. 

 

Shopping for gloves is addicting–there’s endless styles, colors, and patterns to choose from. Typically, baseball glove culture revolves around infield gloves, which are generally smaller and lighter than other mitts. Since the infield is also where the most eye catching plays happen, these gloves tend to be the most visually appealing as well. 

 

Before we slide in to the details, there’s a few rules you should know about handling ball gloves.

 

Rule Number 1:

 

Never put your hand inside another person’s glove without permission. 

 

This is probably our community’s biggest taboo. Though some ballplayers are comfortable letting others evade their gloves with sweaty, grimy, misshapen hands, most enthusiasts will have a ball (pun intended) if you do this. That’s because a broken-in glove has been custom formed to an individual player’s hand. Any foreign invasion will only disrupt the idiosyncrasies that make one’s glove a unique extension of their body.

 

Rule Number 2:

 

Don’t do to your glove what you wouldn’t do to your jewelry.

This includes: steaming it, microwaving it, baking it, freezing it, running it over with your car, sticking it under your mattress, or rubbing shaving cream on it.

 

Instead, consider more acceptable methods of glove care and break-in. For instance: playing catch, using a mallet, or applying glove conditioner made from Red Sea mud extracted from the very path Jesus himself parted and ambulated across (petroleum jelly would work as well).

Rule Number 3: 

If your glove is white, gold, or bright red, then you better be the best damn player on the field. 

A flashy glove means you make flashy plays, so if your glove is the first thing people’s eyes are drawn to, each error you make in the field will translate to a 50% increase in the opposing team’s confidence.   

With some housekeeping out of the way, here’s the good stuff: the top of the line models from the biggest brands in baseball such as Rawlings and Wilson. These gloves are made from unicorn leather sandwiched between the tanned hide of a championship bull-riding bull. The webbing and shape of these gloves are designed with inspiration from vegetation in tropical regions that funnel rainwater towards their roots. The gloves thus enable players to efficiently funnel the ball from the ground and into their throwing hand in one swift motion. 

 

The Air Jordans of the glove world are the Rawlings Heart of the Hide Series and the Wilson a2000 Series infield gloves. These gloves are what the pros, the best high school players, and the most spoiled Little Leaguers use. They take a while to break in, but once they’re game ready, they can last season after season of abuse. Most notably, Troy Tulowitski, a former shortstop for the Rockies, allegedly used the same glove for ten MLB seasons. In fact, he was wearing it when it broke during the middle of a game. 

 

Lately, baseball glove trends have shifted towards customization. Companies such as 44ProGloves offer complete customization–down to the color of the thread that stitches each glove together. They have captured a significant portion of the US glove market by offering affordable gloves that gives players a sense of identity. 

 

However, it also means that sometimes, people make gloves that look like this:

Another modern glove trend has been spurred on by the globalization of baseball. Now, many American baseball players are adopting gloves designed after models made popular by Japanese or Dominican baseball players. For instance, Wilson’s new line of 2020 gloves includes an infield glove with a web and palm pattern reminiscent of the finest Japanese mitts. 

Personally, I think Japanese gloves look a little questionable, but it’s whatever floats your boat.

Perhaps my favorite trend is in glove technology. Synthetic materials including mesh, engineered leathers, and even carbon fiber have made their way into many newer models and have transformed the way gloves look and feel.

Take a look at Nike’s Vapor baseball glove. It’s made out of Nike’s Hyperfuse synthetic leather and laced together with their Flywire. This allows the Vapor to be around 20% lighter than a traditional leather glove. 

Unfortunately, the Vapor was not very successful on the market due to durability concerns, but the idea of synthetic materials has persisted. Rawlings currently offers what they call a Hypershell option on many new gloves. It’s a carbon fiber layer that increases the strength and reduces the weight of the glove as a whole.

Finally, there’s this monstrosity: a $14,100 baseball glove made by Hermes.

It looks like a horrible baseball glove in every way. The leather looks better reserved for a luxury car interior than a dusty baseball field. It’s more of a leather sculpture than a baseball glove. Mitts are functional tools, so at the end of the day, how it plays matters far more than how much it costs.

Here’s some of the most expensive mitts on the market today that people actually use:

So what’s the verdict? Why should you care about baseball gloves? 

Though they definitely aren’t a fashion accessory, gloves make up a lesser known subculture of baseball and sports in general that only people who play the sport will understand. Baseball glove culture serves as a testament to the power of sports to transform, unite, and fascinate. It’s a way for players to express themselves and develop their game. So the next time you’re watching a baseball game, try to suppress your urge to get up and leave for something more exciting, and instead, maybe consider the nuances that continue to make this sport our national past-time. 

I know what you’re thinking.

“I’m not even halfway done with the Sparknotes version of As I Lay Dying. Why should I pick up another William Faulkner story?” 

I can assure you, A Rose for Emily is a compelling twist on Faulkner’s Southern Gothic style you won’t want to put down.

It’s also far more than just a short story. It’s analysis of the prevailing themes of post-Civil War Reconstruction — the tension and conflict between North and South, old and new. It’s a psychological case study of a young woman’s Father Complex, her inability to accept change, and a society’s unwillingness to tolerate differences. A Rose for Emily provides another view through the lens of Faulkner and a deeper look into the social issues pervading America media at the time. It’s a perfect complement to the abstract concepts detailed in As I Lay Dying, the frosting on a metaphorical layer cake that encompasses the works of this Nobel Prize winning author. (Here’s a link to the story if you want a taste.)

Where As I Lay Dying juggles the menagerie of intertwining perspectives of numerous characters, A Rose for Emily follows the life and death of a singular Emily Grierson, albeit in a nonlinear, narrated fashion. 

Where As I Lay Dying dissects the complex relationships between an apathetic mother and her family, A Rose for Emily gives an intriguing account of a father-daughter relationship that ultimately materializes as an extreme (and deadly) case of daddy issues. 

And yes, where As I Lay Dying might seem like a mind warping struggle to read, A Rose for Emily is a much more understandable way to ease into Faulkner.

The story begins at Emily Grierson’s funeral, which happens to be the first public appearance she’s made in years. Yet, the entire town attends her funeral: men who come out of obligation, and women who were more interested in seeing the inside of her house than paying their respects. Her home thus becomes the centerpiece of this story, the vehicle for her transition from vibrant Southern Belle to elderly recluse. 

As a young woman, Emily’s father confines her to the house, turning away every suitor at the door. Emily’s romantic deprivation leads her to become dependent and overly attached to her father. So, when her father dies, her downfall begins. She begins to court a northern man named Homer Baron, much to the disapproval of the townspeople. However, as their brief relationship falls through and the two appear to part ways, Emily’s separation anxiety takes a far more sinister turn.

On the surface, the story appears to be a tragedy: Emily, the victim of her father and the judgement of the town. She’s described as, “A slender figure in white in the background, her father a spraddled silhouette in the foreground, his back to her and clutching a horsewhip, the two of them framed by the back-flung front door.” (Faulkner 2.12)

It’s an image that parallels many other works of literature and art in the early 1900s, most notably, American Gothic, painted in 1930 by Grant Wood. 

In the painting, a farmer and his daughter pose in front of their home. The father, positioned in front of his daughter, wields a pitchfork. It’s menacing. He glares at you through the painting, asserting his authority, making it clear that his daughter is off limits. The daughter can only obey. Her expression is stern. She looks at her father as in a subordinate manner. According to Mia Fineman, a curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the painting is widely considered, “a satire about the rigidity of American rural or small-town life, lampooning the people H. L. Mencken called the “booboisie*” of the “Bible Belt.”” (Fineman) Thus A Rose for Emily may have an alternative interpretation as a satire, criticizing the conservative rural values that confined women to homes and rejected individuality.

The painting also perfectly encapsulates the meaning of A Rose for Emily. Emily, depicted quite literally as a background character, is overshadowed first by an oppressive relationship with her father, and then by a town that chooses to regard her with pity, rather than acceptance. 

According to Renee Curry, a professor at California State University Monterey Bay, “The stylistics of Faulkner’s language thus serves to subordinate Emily, ostensibly the subject of the tale, and to elevate the town as the truer subject.” (Curry) Emily’s story is not the focal point of Faulkner’s piece. Instead, he uses it to convey a broader theme: how a person’s fate is often dictated by the society that surrounds them. Herein lies the intricacies of A Rose for Emily.

The entire story is told through the perspective of an anonymous narrator who appears to be an omniscient towns-person. In her youth, the town views Emily with jealousy, manifested in the form of reverence. After her breakup with Homer, she is “left alone, and a pauper[.] [S]he had become humanized.” (Faulkner) 

The town discards Emily. They cast her aside. Her only role becomes being the topic of village gossip. It’s a cynical message: society doesn’t mind when people fail, but they hate to see people succeed. It satirizes the rural community attitude of conformity, of weeding out differences, of oppressing those who are different and expecting their compliance.

Emily’s fate was sealed at the death of her father. When her aristocratic standing was terminated, she was left to the mercy of the town, which chose to treat her as an outcast and play it off as her own choice. 

It’s dark, but what Southern Gothic story isn’t? It casts a pessimistic light on society, but many may argue it’s in fact realism. A Rose for Emily, though, will surely make you think: how does our society reject people who don’t fit our standards of normal? How have we allowed the collective to shape our perception of individuality?

So while you can, leave Sparknotes alone and pick up A Rose for Emily instead. Sparknotes is a site that presents the mainstream meaning of a novel. It assigns a book a certain fate: how a group of people decided it should be interpreted. Embrace your own ideas, no matter how rough or thorny they may be. Don’t take a rose for what it’s worth. Peel back the petals and look inside. I guarantee you’ll find something you didn’t expect.

 

* “booboisie” is a derogatory term coined by Mencken in 1922 for people who are uneducated and uncultured. It comes from the combination of “boob” (careless) and “bourgeoise”.

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Works Cited:

Curry, Renee R. “Gender And Authorial Limitation In Faulkner’s “A Rose For Emily.” (Special Issue: William Faulkner).” The Mississippi Quarterly 47.3 (1994): 391. Web. 18 Oct. 2019.

Fineman, M. (2019). The Most Famous Farm Couple in the World. [online] Slate. Available at: https://slate.com/culture/2005/06/the-most-famous-farm-couple-in-the-world.html [Accessed 18 Oct. 2019].

Faulkner, William. A Rose for Emily. 1930.

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Additional Information:

Link to story: http://xroads.virginia.edu/~drbr/wf_rose.html

Vox video:

 

The best time to try something new is in the dead of summer when all your friends are away at camp or vacation and the egg-frying properties of the sidewalk make outdoor activity impossible. 

This year, my annual attempt to “make the most out of my summer” came around early July. At the time, I was pretty content working two part time jobs and watching Daily Dose of Internet on Youtube but I couldn’t help but feel unfulfilled. I hadn’t satisfied my creative instincts just yet.

One muggy evening, I finished dinner and walked outside to go on my daily solitary bike ride around the neighborhood, which usually involved a lot of internal monologue and using the curbs as a very toned-down half-pipe course. As I slipped on my Crocs, I noticed a piece of wood had fallen in the corner of my garage. I walked over and picked it up. It was a long stick of maple. As I rested it again in the corner where it had sat for the last 10 years with the other various wood scraps my grandpa gathered over the years, I wondered if perhaps there was something more I could do with this wood.

My younger sister was currently in the midst of remodeling her room, and I had just helped her replace the tarnished brass door knobs on her closet doors with more contemporary steel ones. The next step was to find a place to put her 20+ medals that were currently dangling precariously off a corner of her mirror.

So I set to work making her a medal rack. I sanded the wood to remove the paint and reveal the beautiful grain, sawed it down to size, then used the gas burners in my kitchen to give it a distressed antique look. I hammered in some nails, mounted it on her wall, and the project was complete.

After that, I decided that I was a woodworker.

There was something addictive about the woodworking process. It’s a somewhat oxymoronic feeling; dynamic monotony, so to speak: performing repetitive motions in a way that compounds to form something greater. My workshop may seem like a boring place at first glance, but even the most mundane work, such as sanding a piece before painting, becomes exciting once you have an end result in sight. As corny as it may sound, when I enter my workshop, I lose track of time. I become absorbed in the details, the cuts made down to the millimeter, the corners measured to be perfectly perpendicular. When I can see the finished product start to take shape, my enthusiasm only increases. It’s a chain of events — a positive feedback loop — that feeds my passion for woodworking.

My next project involved making a jewelry rack for my girlfriend, whose necklaces always got tangled up. I researched woodworking techniques and learned about rabbet joinery, proper table saw usage, and painting methods. This project was a bit more complex. I spent hours sawing, drilling, and sanding in my garage, which was not much cooler than the surrounding atmosphere, leaving me dripping with sweat and covered in sawdust. The jewelry rack project was a milestone for me because I was able to combine the skills I developed from other classes and activities. For instance, I created a 3D model of the rack on Sketchup before I made my first cut. I also had to resolve a lot of geometric issues, such as making sure the bracelet holder on the rack would accommodate the average diameter of her bracelets. During this project, I also developed my own methods of fabrication. In one case, I needed to cut brass tubes to serve as ring holders, but was unable to make a clean cut. To resolve this, I locked the brass tube in my drill, then used a hacksaw to score the metal as the tube spun beneath it. Ultimately, my efforts were well worth it, as the jewelry rack came out beautifully and still hangs in her room to this day.

My woodworking journey continued that summer as I found new ways to use the scrap wood laying around my house and neighborhood. I created a welcome sign using two planks I salvaged from my neighbor’s remodeling project and personalized wood signs (currently on sale on Etsy https://www.etsy.com/shop/NEDAWoodSigns?ref=shop_sugg) using the leftover wood used to build our deck many years ago.

When school started, I decided to join the woods club. When I walked through the door, I realized I discovered an entirely new corner of the school. Before me lay an expanse of miter saws, planers, table saws, laser cutters, band saws, and a CNC mill! It was basically woodworking heaven. 

The wood shop is now probably my new favorite place at school. Last week, I used the laser cutter to cut out balsa wood frames for an event I’m doing in Science Olympiad. The week before that I used the band saw and planer to make a jig for a different event. My experience in woodworking has heightened all aspects of my engineering interests. Not only did it improve my knack for design and construction, it inspired me to embrace my creative side, prompting me to undertake a capstone project where I am attempting to 3D print high quality saxophone mouthpieces (will be discussed more in a later post).

Wood is an amazing material. It’s strong, lightweight, flexible, and beautiful. When given the right tools and a solid plan, a few pieces of wood can become almost anything. I’ve only begun to scratch the surface of what woodworking has in store for me, and I couldn’t be more excited to see what’s ahead. 

To me, woodworking isn’t just something I picked up as a way to get through the dog days of summer. It’s the culmination of years of artistic and engineering experience. It’s the ultimate expression of my creative abilities.