Blondie In The City

The other day I was exploring downtown Denver with a friend, and I came across these stairs. It was after the empathetic design exercise, so I couldn't talk about it there, but I can talk about it on here! I'm gonna start with the fact that I think big huge stairways are cool because we only really have small ones where I'm from. But regardless, I think these ones that I came across are additionally cool because if you look closely, you can see that there is a ramp built into the stairs. So not only is this a very accommodating feature to people who might not be able to get up stairs as well, but an aesthetically pleasing design choice. Usually, when I think about empathetic design, I think of metal ramps next to concrete stairs you can tell they didn't add until very recently. But with this, I absolutely love how it's built in, and was obviously not made with the boundaries of how we think a ramp should look or how people usually build them anyways. 

 Ingredients - Rice (the big 5 pound bags that you stand up in your kitchen are ideal) - Water - Rice cooker Steps 1. Get however much rice you like and put it in the rice cooker 2. WASH IT. A lot of people don't wash their rice, please rinse it a few times at least. 3. You dump out the dirty water 4. You put your finger in the bowl touching the top of the rice just barely 5. You fill the water up until it lines up with the first line on your finger 6. Cook the rice

A list of differences that I have noticed in my day to day life since moving to Colorado: (I used to live on a small tropical island) - I can leave drinks in my room and they will not get ants - I don't think I've seen ants more that one time here - The heat cycle of the days is like a few hours later than I am used to. For example, it reaches the hottest at like 1 instead of 11, and starts cooling down at like 8 rather than 6 - Things like chocolate will not melt if they are in my bag all day - I check the temperature on my phone instead of looking at the sky and the clouds - I can wear hoodies and not sweat - It's weird not having the ocean right next to me all the time - I haven't encountered like more than one bug inside a building - At home I have geckos always climbing around on the walls and I miss that - You can walk to almost everything here - Walking here is a lot more enjoyable because it doesn't feel like it's 95 degrees outside - I think about this

The other day I was talking to these people and one of them was saying they used to drink wine with their dinner with their parents and then go do homework. And now he likes doing homework a little intoxicated. I got to thinking about it and honestly, I do think it has a lot to do with creativity. In this class we're learning all about how creativity is about letting loose and being okay with accepting "weird" ideas. And I guess that's partially what happens when you drink, your brain stops following the social structure that you were raised to follow and people often do things under the influence that they wouldn't have normally done. I'm not saying anything about the way alcohol affects your consciousness, or ability to make good decisions, but I'm saying the "liquid courage" in you helps you be a little braver. Which is what we are training ourselves to do (sober) in this class. I know that people don't drink alcohol to be more creative bu