Future of our Nation

I watched an hour long online town hall meeting about the importance of math and science in our education systems hosted by former Vice President Al Gore. The town hall emphasis tried to further articulate what everyone in educational reform is trying to accomplish, how to change our school systems to have higher graduation rates and keeping students interested and passionate about the topics they are learning in school. I kept thinking how much has changed within students' study habits and teachers' methods of teaching even since the time I was in middle and high school. Technology and social media combined are playing a significant role in shaping our society today, and I could even confidently say that a majority of people are dependent on facebook, twitter, etc. to know what is happening within society. Due to the dependency of these sources, many students have other "bigger concerns" i.e. what's going on in Hollywood.

Americans are competitive and strive to be on top, as we have been doing for the past 100 years or so as the international hegemon. However, we are losing our luster and making other minute topics in life more important. I personally believe that media is at fault with swaying the interest of Americans; within any hourly news, all the stories are dramatic 15 minutes of fame type stories. The stories are usually dedicated to - Did you hear about that big accident? Did you know that the Hollywood "it" couple got a divorce? How many times has Lindsey Lohan gone to rehab?. REALLY?!  During the town hall, people got to see a very short version of John F. Kennedy's going to the moon speech, and I posted a video of clips of his speech at Rice University on del's inspiration. His speech is motivational and full of inspiration, letting Americans know that anything is possible in the future. Americans need to believe in JFK's message of great optimism and hope, and apply it to today's scenarios of overcoming the economic recession, faulty education system, and other debatable issues. We need to know our priorities.

"The goal of education is the advancement of knowledge and the dissemination of truth." - John F. Kennedy

Inspiration

I just launched Inspiration via tumblr. I've decided to keep two separate blogs, this one dedicated to my personal ramblings and inspiration dedicated to the things that make me happy. Inspiration is my world of happiness, it's seriously a whole lot of happy. haha.
 

Go check it out! Enjoy.

www.delsinspiration.tumblr.com

Frustration towards ignorance

Today, my mom and I went to the to purchase some makeup and nail polish at Macy's. I usually don't need to buy make up too often, but it's always fun seeing what new products are on the market and whatnot. For the most part when I'm shopping, I like to be left alone - if I needed assistance I'll ask. I know that employees are just doing their job, trying to be sincere and maybe get some commission when they do approach customers, and I politely either respond "No, we're just looking around" or proceed to actually ask them a question. When shopping with my mom, there are times when my mom's English gets jumbled, so it's easier for her when I just ask the questions that need to be answered.

As we are shopping and looking around, this one lady consistently approaches us asking if there is anything she can do to help. Every time I respond, "No, we're just looking around". Well it becomes time to ask the questions and start buying the specific products we wanted. We needed two things - a lip stick and nail polish. This lady spends 10 minutes searching for the lip stick and looking like she really didn't know what she was doing, ends up telling us that they ran out of the color we wanted. Fine. I ask her about the nail polish, and finally begins to ring our bill at the cash register. As any other Macy's employee, she asks if we would like to open a Macy's credit card and get whatever percent interest/discount. My mom and I both politely respond, "No, thank you." Of course, this employee asks again, "Are you sure? You can get whatever discount." We both again say no and my mom adds that we are not interested.

THEN, this lady has the audacity to ask, "Does [your mom] not have social security?" WTF. Why are people so ignorant?! Just because a person has an accent and are not interested in your damn credit card definitely does NOT equate to being an illegal immigrant. I'm pretty sure I first gave her the shocked face, then proceeded with a huge stank eye. My mom and I both walked away looking at each other baffled.

Fantasy Land

I'm not sure if you all know, I've been quite obsessed with reading wedding/design/things that just make me happy and inspired type blogs. I'm sure I've mentioned it before numerous times, so y'all are sick of me telling you. haha. Lately, I've been backlogged in trying to keep up with these hundreds of posts. So, I'm sitting here trying to read/skim as many posts as I can about other people's weddings to find more inspirations. (note: I don't look through all these wedding blogs to plan my wedding, but it doesn't hurt to look...)

Anways, to the point... As I read/look at more and more of these posts, I feel as if I'm in a fantasy land of weddings. Obviously there are going to be ideas that I relate to more than others, but I feel like all these wedding really do portray the "perfect" day/couple. To me, a wedding just became THAT much more important. hahah.

VolunteerLA

Just spent the first half of my day painting at Los Angeles Elemetary School, and met some cool volunteers as well, Jenna and Katy. Ended up painting the mural with Jackie Robinson of the LA DODGERSSSS.

YAY! I thought we got a lot done, and the school looked significantly different with the splashes of color from the many murals painted on the bungalows.  After a long successful morning, mama and I decided to head to Burbank. Lo and behold, there was a Krispy Kreme - I haven't had one of their perfectly soft original glazed donuts in years. I actually was super excited when I saw the HOT DONUTS NOW sign. Yum.

Pasedenaaaa..

Been fairly busy this week, compared to others.

Tonight, I got to spend good quality time with one of my pals, Jamie. Finally set up a date, time, and place and decided to meet up for some awesome Greek food at Zankou's Chicken in Old Town. Old Town is always so much fun, and always feels like you're not in LA anymore. It was the first time for both of us to go to Zankou's, and I think we both really enjoyed the food. I'm always happy to be able to catch up with good friends. Thanks for the wonderful hangout/catch up session love! I'm glad we found some good, not overused inspirational quotes! :)

P.S. If you ever want some powerful sleep inducing tea, check out Intellegensia in Old Town. The setting and decor of this cafe was so awesome, it's my type of scene.

I LOVE NY

The last time I was in New York, this past summer with Jo and Mel, while chilling at an Anthropolgie, I read through some of the stories that these actors, artists, and other "famous" people shared about their first experience/adventure in the big apple. Let me tell you, some of these stories were hilarious! Adam Sandberg's story still sticks with me, I literally laughed out loud as other women looked at me strangely and continued to shop around. This book reminds me of my first adventure in NYC, which somehow converted into my love for the city. The rest is history.

The first time I went to New York was when I was about 9 years old, it was the summer before I entered the 4th grade. My aunt, me, and my two cousins went on an east coast road trip from NY to DC, Virginia, West Virginia, Canada, and back to NY. Our trip was great, and like any other vacation it would have been memorable no matter what. The icing on top for this entire trip was when we "lost" our rental car, which had our passports and all our luggage the day before our flight back to LA.

It all went something like this...

We were watching Les Miserables on Broadway, so we parked our car in some sketchy alley looking street, Park Place. My aunt got Park Place and Park Ave. mixed up, so after the show all four of us spent 9 hours walking around NYC, sightseeing/shopping/looking for our car. We eventually got so desperate that we sought the help of New York's finest, NYPD. No luck there. We took one last attempt to try to find the car while in a taxi, and voila FOUND IT! Since it was too late to check into a hotel and our flight was in a the next 8 hours or so, we ended up sleeping in the car. hahah. As the youngest of our group I naturally was the whiniest and crankiest person by the end of the night. 9 hours walking around NYC + summer humidity + no bed = whiny and cranky 9 year old Delia.

After all that, NY has become one of my favorite cities in the world (even if I haven't been to every city in the world). I hope I get to live there sometime, even for a little bit during my life time. I'm trying to even half jokingly/seriously convince my parents that we should relocate our family to the east coast once my brother is done with college and my parents start thinking about retiring. My parents are old school, and my dad always jokes that he and my mom are going to my a super sporty 2 seat convertible and live in the countryside. I think this cabin on the rooftop in NYC will do.

via cabbage rose

Getting there...

I used to love Halloween because it of course meant candy, carnivals, and trick or treating! As I grew older, I fell out of the whole hulubaloo spirit of Halloween; I didn't go trick or treating, and our house finally stopped handing out treats sometime in the middle of when I was in high school. I read of a lot of decor, wedding, and baking blogs, all of which have definitely started posting their Halloween decorating ideas (minus the wedding blogs), but I was definitely stunned by this picture... Kudos to this lady! Happy almost Halloween y'all!

Via Bakerella