Reflections from a song

Dont kid yourself
and don't fool yourself
this love's too good to last
and i'm too old to dream

Don't grow up too fast
and don't embrace the past
this life's too good to last
and i'm too young to care

Don't kid yourself
and don't fool yourself
this life could be the last
and we're too young to see

This is a song from the British alternative rock band, Muse. I am personally a big fan of theirs and this week I feel like talking about life in general since I am turning 1 year older soon. :) I find this song very meaningful for people who are reflecting upon their age and life. I have yet to find the meaning of the song but I will give my personal interpretation of it.

Stanza 1:

Dont kid yourself
and don't fool yourself
this love's too good to last
and i'm too old to dream

I take that the first 2 sentences calls for us to be realistic about life and not fool ourselves with the delusions that we wish we could have. When it comes to love, something that is forever lasting would be too good of a thing, just like a fairy tale where everything finishes with a happy ending. We should be over with this kind of childish fantasies/dreams of perfect love. Love is imperfect and we should have a mature mind towards relationships. We are just too old for fairy tales.

Stanza 2 and 3:

Don't grow up too fast
and don't embrace the past
this life's too good to last
and i'm too young to care

Don't kid yourself
and don't fool yourself
this life could be the last
and we're too young to see

This stanza calls for us to well, not grow up too fast! Enjoy the youth and happiness you have as a kid/adolescent. Have all the fun and learn things as you can before the heavy responsibilities of being an adult come to you. And when you have grown up into an adult, don’t feel regret and live in the shadow of your past. Whatever you have done/not done should not be stopping you from moving forward and learning from your mistakes. Don’t dwell in your past because life is short and we should live it to the fullest. We are too young to think about what will happen to us in the future, so live in the moment and don’t be too pessimistic about future outcomes that it hinders you in the present.

Logos we know that we dont know

One day I was checking my email and I got an interesting email from my friend. No, it's not a spam but an email about logos and their meaning. More often than not, logos are a company's identity and a lot of work goes into designing something so simple yet represents a big part of a company. I would know because I am an MI student ;)

There were some interesting information I learnt from the email so I thought I'd share them here too!

Amazon

This logo doesnt seem to hide much at first sight but it gives you a little insight in the philosophy behind the brand. first of all, the yellow swoosh looks likes a smile: Amazon.com want to have the best customer satisfaction. The swoosh also connects the letters A to Z which shows that the store has everything from A to Z.

Fedex

If you look closely, you'll see an arrow that is formed by the letters E and x. This arrow symbolizes speed and precision, 2 major selling points of this company. I really never notice the arrow in the Fedex logo so I think it is cool! ;)

Continental

Do you notice the 3D looking tyre from the very first 2 letters? Continental is a manufacturer of tyres.

Toblerone

Toblerone is a chocolate-company from Bern, Switzerland. Bern is sometimes called ‘The City Of Bears’. They have incorporated this idea in the Toblerone logo, because if you look closely, you’ll see the silhouette of a bear.

Baskin Robins

The old logo of Baskin Robbins had the number 31 with an arc above it. This new logo however took the idea of incorporating the number 31 into the initials of Baskin Robbins, BR.

Sony Vaio

Sony Vaio is well known brand of laptops. But did you know that the Vaio logo has a hidden meaning in it? the first 2 letters represent the basic analogue signal while the last 2 letters look like 1 and 0, representing binaries which are digital signals.

Carrefour

Carrefour is one of the biggest European retailers, and it’s also French for “crossroads”. The logo symbolizes this word via two opposite arrows. They also added the first letter of the name, because if you look closely you’ll see the letter C in the negative space between the two arrows.

Unilever

Unilever is one of the biggest producers of food, beverages, cleaning agents and personal care products. They produce a huge amount of different products and they wanted to reflect this in their logo. Each part of the logo has a meaning. For example: the heart represents love, care and health - feeling good, a bird is a symbol of freedom. Relief from daily chores – getting more out of life.

Formula 1

At first, this logo might not make much sense. But if you look closely, you’ll see the number 1 in the negative space between the F and the red stripes. I also love how this logo communicates a feeling of speed.

Sun Microsystems

The Sun logo is one of the most famous ambigrams in the world. You can read the brand name in every direction; both horizontally and vertically. This logo was designed by professor Vaughan Pratt of the Stanford University.

NBC

The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is one of the biggest American television networks, The peacock has 6 different tail feathers, referring to the 6 divisions at the time the logo was created. The peacock's head if flipped to the right to suggest it was looking forward, not back.

Amazing Doodles

Martha Graham's 117th birthday Google Doodle

Did anyone notice the neat animation (above image) from Google's homepage? Here's a video of the same theme from the animator, Ryan Woodward.

If anyone are Google users, you all would have noticed their doodles which appear once in a while, are innovative and quirky surprises that most of us are delighted to find when we open the ever resourceful search engine! As a loyal Google user, I have often seen their doodles and enjoy seeing them. It may be trivial information but it's nice to know the day the ice cream sundae was invented (3rd April 1892) ;)

Ice cream sundae Google Doodle

For those of you who dont know what a Google Doodle is, it is the graphics you see at the Google logo whenever you see their homepage. It is usually done to celebrate the anniversary of a certain event/object/person. Back in the days, the Google doodles would have 1 thing in common, which is the design must have the letters of Google's name and they are non moving.

Previous Google Doodles that were non moving

But with the passing of time, those Doodles have gotten more livelier as they are starting to emerge as Flash animations to interactive features like a game or navigator to even a video! Here are recent examples of Google Doodles that you can check out:

Charlie Chaplin doodle

(Since I dont know how to include 2 videos in 1 post, I put the Charlie Chaplin doodle as a link to Youtube instead!)
Yupp, it was a 2 minute video of their own story with Charlie Chaplin as their character. I think this is one of the most innovative Doodles from Google ever since it is a full on video instead of an animation.

This Google Doodle was to celebrate Jule Vernse's birthday who is the French science fiction author who pioneered the genre itself. His most famous work is Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea which was published in 1870 and the inspiration for this Doodle. The handle on the right side enables you to 'navigate' the animation that goes on in the 'Google windows'

This Google Doodle is about the first World's Fair in London. The interaction here is that by moving your cursor over the Doodle, a magnifying glass will appear and you will be able to see up close and personal the little things happening in the mini World's Fair


This is the Google Doodle that I think has not much resemblence to the Google logo, however those designs were images of actual sculpting creations of Constantin Brâncuş. This Doodle was to commemorate his 135th birthday on 19th February 1876.

Another brilliant Doodle by Google is this Pacman game! It really can be played by the user and it was actually custom built from the ground up using JavaScript, HTML, and CSS on the homepage. Unlike any other Doodles, this one stayed on the homepage for 48 hours. To know more about how this Doodle came about, go to this article.

Everyday objects= Earth killers

Now that we know how important and urgent it is to save the environment, it’s pretty easy for us to don’t know where or how to start. Well fret not, here are facts we need to know about our everyday objects that we use all the time and not realise the effects of them on Earth. The more we know about them, the easier we can start on our change for the good of the Earth!

Batteries

Did you know the average person may thrown away at least 8 batteries per year? More than 80% of the mercury in the waste stream, can be traced to discarded batteries. All batteries, single-use ones and rechargeable contain mercury, lead and nickel which can leak in landfills and harm the environment. It’s however a better idea to get rechargeable ones so you throw out less of them. Plus most electronic stores now offer to dispose of batteries properly, so don’t just throw them out and pollute the earth.

Cigarettes

An incredible amount of paper is used just to manufacture 1 cigarette, that is not taking into account, cigarette boxes and packaging. Cigarette buttes are one of the most visible trash pollutants and it takes an amazingly long 5 years for each cigarette bud to biodegrade

Electronics, computers, TVS and phones

All electronics which includes your computer, TV and mobile phones contain lead, mercury and other harmful metals. Although these may be fine when in use, it an be dangerous if not disposed properly. The lead found in these items leaches into out soil and becomes toxic to all life, including us.

Nail polish and remover

Nail polish and removers contain highly toxic chemicals like acetone, formaldehyde and phthalates which eventually evaporate and contaminate the air we breathe or seep into the ground and effect the water we drink

Expired medication

Medication that has passed its due date isn’t just a bad idea for you to swallow but also to throw ut! Studies have shown that medication that has been flushed down the toilet has contributed to the contamination of drinking water in several major cities. This in turn can also be hazardous to wildlife that live in these water resources

Mothballs

Mothballs are made from 2 key chemicals which are naphthalene and paradichlorobenzene that are suppose to evaporate into the environment. These chemicals can either be broken down by sunlight or bacteria. If disposed improperly it can seep into water and soil causing it to affect marine life and contaminate the Earth.

An end has a start

Since the existence of mankind, many has been invented, changed and revolutionized to be where we are today, the 21^st Century. And as we all know, the environmental/going green buzz has been becoming a very popular theme/topic in every single thing we see, be it from movies to fashion to assignment topics to basically EVERYTHING! Surely everything has its beginnings so I stumbled across an article that talks about the the timeline of the impact humans on the environment from the very beginning to the present and to the near future.

THE BEGINNING- The Earth is about 4.55 billion years old but modern humans have only been around for about 2.2 million years.

1800- The Industrial Revolution began between the 18^th to 19^th century and marked a major turning point for both Earth’s ecology and humans. We started turning coal and fossil fuels to drive steam engines and other devices. We also saw a change in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, transportation and technology, all of which took a significant toll on Earth.

1900- Deforestation for commercial and agricultural purposes starts on a big scale to maek way for urbanization in the 20^th century.

1945- The atom bomb was dropped in Hiroshima and Nagasaki which sparked the first nuclear warfare and nuclear pollution. The after effects include everything from severe radiation to humans and animals to climate change which lasted for decades

1952- The Great London Smog of December 1952 killed approximately 4000 people as a result of really bad air pollution

1960- The number of ocean ‘dead zones’ which are patches of ocean devoid of life began doubling each year

1984- The Bhopal Disaster happened and was considered to be the world’s worst industrial catastrophe. A leak of methyl isocyanate gas and other chemicals from a plant in India resulted in a spill of toxic waste. Even 20 years after, the ground and water surrounding still shows signs of toxic compounds

1990- The 90s was named the hottest decade on record but sadly we expect it to only get worst

1999- The world population reaches the 6 billion mark increasing the requirements for resources, energy, food housing and land as well as the exponential increase in waste by-products.

2004- The Tsunami in 2004, Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and host of other natural isasters speak global concern over the drastic change in climate

2005- The Kyoto Protocol was drawn as an attempt to get worldwide support against global warming. Its aim was monitor and lower greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere from 2008 to 2012. As of July 2010, 191 states have signed and ratified the protocol

2015- By this year, oil output will decline and cause massive global shortages

2025- If the rainforests continue to be logged as they currently are, we will reach the point of no return by 2030

THE END- It is still uncertain what the distant future holds for mankind and Earth, some suggest that we might have to move life to Mars instead as our planet will be so destroyed and depleted that it will be inhabitable for any life. Many of the environmental effects can still be reversible if we start doing changes NOW!