Being Here (On Earth)

Isn't life just beautiful?

corner view "traditions"

Since it's close to Christmas, I'll talk about the family Christmas traditions. Every year, we get a tree. (We now have a fake tree which saves money and trees.) Then when it's time to decorate it, we put on Christmas music (our favorite is "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree") and Mom picks out the ornaments one by one for the kids to put on the tree.

By Theresa Marks

 By Theresa Marks

For more traditions, visit my mom, Theresa.

corner view "improvising"

I guess you could call me spontaneous. I love surprises! I love last minute outings or trips (especially if it's ice cream or something).  

I also admire different kinds of improvising. There are a lot, if you don't know, so I'll just talk about a couple, my two favorites.

Number one, musical improvisation. That's when you stay in a scale and hit any of its notes at random. Sometimes you'll get little snippits of cool sounds and may be able to create a new song out of it if you're lucky. It's usually best to record your improvs so you can listen back to them and find songs. Probably the person who's best at this is Keith Jarrett. Pretty complex, but if you really listen he is a genius beyond genius. Another great musician in this field is more unknown, Art Lande. He was my Dad's musical mentor. He goes into different times, like instead of 4/4 time he'll go into 13 or 11 or 7 or 5!

Keith Jarrett

My other favorite type of improv is comedic improvisation. It's my favorite type of comedy and seems to be Robin Williams' too. He's my favorite. You know how we have two funny bones? I think every bone in his body is a funny bone! :)

Here are two quotes from Robin. :) Ain't he great? 

If it's the Psychic Network why do they need your phone number?  

When you create, you get a little endorphin rush. Why do you think Einstein looked like that?

For more improvising, visit my mom, Theresa.

corner view "rain"

Some people don't like the rain.

I love it! Whenever it rains I go outside. (It's always warm here.) I take an umbrella and my iPod and I go out for a walk.

Usually it looks like this.

But sometimes, you'll catch this.

P.S. For more thoughts about the sky, see my blog post below. 

For more corner views, visit my mom, Theresa.

Can you believe we are in there, somewhere?

As even amateur nerds know, light travels at 186,000 miles per second. Much faster then even my Dad's car. :)
The Moon is 1.3 light seconds away from Earth.
The sun is 8.5 light minutes away.
Saturn is 84 light minutes away.
Pluto is 250 light minutes away.

Now here's the wild part...
The next sun beyond ours is 4.2 light years away.

I really like the name of this cluster of stars -- The Dumbbell Nebula. Named because the disc-like shape reminds the eye of a dumbbell (not because the nebula is dumb).  If it was dumb, we'd never know it, because it's a thousand light years away.

The Blinking Eye Nebula probably sees the light of the Dumbbell nebula the same time we do because it's two thousand light years away.

The Bug Nebula and the Red Spider Nebula are four thousand light years away.

The Rotten Egg Nebula and the Boomerang Nebula (I kid you not) are five thousand light years away.

Moving right along, the Black Eye galaxy is 17 light years away from our fists, but it got beat-up anyway.

The tadpole Galaxy hasn't quite found its way out of the pond. In fact, it's 420 million light years away from the nearest known pond.

Three billion light years away is a galactic cluster called Abell 2218; which makes you wonder, is there a Cain 2218? Or don't they have a choice between good and evil three billion light years from us?

Finally I leave you with Hubble Ultra Deep Field Galaxies -- the most distant galaxies known. Formed when the universe was a mere eight hundred million years old. An infant compared to it's present age of more than thirteen billion years old.

If we could get our hands on the Hubble Ultra Deep Field Galaxies, would we figure out a way to turn them into the Hubble Ultra Deep Fried Galaxies? Traveling long distances does make us hungry.

Thanks to my Dad to turning me onto all the weird names and inserting some of his weird humor.

Unlike a lot of the things humans say, everything I just wrote is true!

Here's looking at you, kid...

Regards,

From the Red Eye Nebula:

corner view "different perspective"

For my corner view, I think I'll talk about the different perspectives of children and adults.

To children, the world is big and wonderful. There are so many new sights to see, people to meet and things to try. Everything is an adventure. 

To most adults, the world can be a pain most of the time. Work, rushing around, errands, driving everywhere. They lose the childlike innocence. They've seen most of the things children get so excited about like the ocean or a mountain or bubbles floating in the air, but to an adult, these things are nothing special. But you can always, no matter what age, see beauty in everything and keep that childlike innocence forever.

For more perspectives, visit my mom,  Theresa.

corner view "anything goes" or as I like to say, "randomness" :)

Earlier this month, I decided to do some art. I'm not very good at drawing, I'll admit. So sometimes I go on Photoshop, take a picture and trace over the picture section by section, color by color. Let me tell you, it's very time consuming. There is a name for this kind of art work, but I can't remember the name. Something that starts with a "T". Anyway, since I'm really into Robin Williams at the moment and I was frustrated at my many attempts to draw him on paper (they didn't turn out well) I decided to turn to my trusty computer. :)

 It took me a while, but it was worth it. What do you think?

To see more random corner views, go to my Mom, Theresa.

The Faces of Shawn

I have to tell you something about my little brother. He's awesome. Really! He's one of those people with that special spark. He's very strong, very cool, and VERY generous. Every so often he will give me free Pokemon cards (something he and my sister, Annabel are very into right now). And, usually, even if he's in a bad mood, he'll give me a hug. Well, sometimes he says, "I'm not mad at you, Skylar, I'm mad at mom." :)

Here are the diferent faces of Shawn...

 Regular Shawn

 Thinking Shawn

 Goofy Shawn

 Stubborn Shawn

 Loving Shawn

 Musical Shawn

 Super Shawn

 Rockin' Shawn :P 

 Video Game Shawn

Helpful Shawn

And my favorite... Hugging-Sister Shawn

You rock, dude! 

Love,

Skylar

corner view "autumn"

Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower.  ~Albert Camus

Where I am, we don't have seasons. It's summer all the time! :) So I take advantage of it when I can when we travel in autumn, which is rare. 


I've always imagined sitting in front of a fire on a chilly autumn night. But if we sat in front of a fire here? Yuck! 


My best autumn memory was in California, one November. My mom came out with my little sister and me and we jumped in piles of leaves for hours. :)


For more autumn (real autumn) go to the side bar on my mom, Theresa's Blog.

corner view "famous"

Me, well, I've told you people that I have admirations. Or obsessions, if it's necessary to call them that. But for me, I'm picky. Probably the first obsession was my Daddy. :) Then came Cathy Rigby after watching Peter Pan so many times that my sister and I could recite it from beginning to end. Then came the Beatles! Oh yes, an obsession that lasted 2 1/2 years. The longest one ever! Then came Amma. Robin Williams came when I was ten -- such a funny dude! It wasn't really an obsession at that point. Then Tom Hanks. Then Michael Jackson, one of my bigger ones. And now, Robin Williams again. Except this time, it's more of an obsession, plus, I can now see the PG-13 movies. :) Back then, I couldn't see much. And I couldn't see his stand-ups, he's not exactly...clean. But I love him anyway... :)

Anyway, all of these people changed my life in big ways and subtle ways. Whether it was teaching me music, making me want to learn gymnastics, teaching me joy and harmonies, teaching me compassion, or how to take on different characters when I act, or how gentleness and power can be combined into something brilliant, or how to make people laugh. I wish I could personally thank them for all that they've done for me. Maybe, some day, except for Michael, *sniff sniff*. Of course, I thank my dad all the time. :)

 Thank you Google for the Pictures :)

So, these are my favorite famous people! For more famous people, go to my mom, Theresa.

Happy Halloween!!

Nanu Nanu! :D

Annabel is Piper, a character from the book, The Lost Hero, by Rick Riordan. 

Shawn is also a character from that book. He's Leo. :)

Happy Halloween, Everyone!