New Miniseries! And 5 Ingenious TEDTalks

This summer, I really wanted to make sure that I didn't just lounge around lazily and regress to being about as smart as a potato with eyes (OITNB reference!). Most summers, I feel like I happily laze around the beach and watch TV--which is great...until classes start back up. Then I realize that I can't remember how to long divide or spell 'embarrass'. 

So this summer, I took a more strategic approach to my activities. To use an annoying phrase, I wanted to "train my brain". This meant that I read books, listened to podcasts, read science journals + watched lectures and educational videos. Surprisingly (or maybe not, if you know anything about my nerdy self), it was super fun for me! I felt smart and at the top of my brain-game (annoying phrase number two) and actually enjoyed learning new things! 

As a new mini-series, I want to share more about these ways I stay mentally active over summer and outside of classes. Also--if anyone can come up with a name for this miniseries, I'll gladly credit you + send you a really nice piece of snail mail. Give me ideas in the comments!!

Today, I'm sharing my favorite TEDtalks. If you don't know, TEDtalks are lectures given by people in all sorts of fields about new ideas, projects, or perspectives. They're short--often 10 minutes or less!

PRO TIP: Watch with subtitles so you don't miss anything!

1. A shark-deterrant wetsuit (and it's not what you think)

2. Six ways mushrooms can save the world.

3. How we found the giant squid (Edith Widder)

4. The sore problem of prosthetic limbs

5. How healthy living almost killed me

And, another pro tip: the topics section. Sort videos by topics that interest you--for me that means productivity, marine life, music, etc. For you, that could be something totally different! 

4 Genius TEDTalks (Part Two!)

You can see Part One here!

Hello lovelies! As promised, I'm here to share some of my very favorite TEDTalks with you today. But
first off, how was your day? In the comments below, tell me one great thing that happened to you today! For me, I got a big statistics test back and got a 96. Oh yes, bow down.

Haha anyways, I hope you have had a fantastic day and if you live in my part of the world, hopefully you're getting ready for bed (which is what I should be doing right now....). If not, watch some of these TEDTalks and prepare to feel your brain literally stretch (bad use of the word literally)!


1. My hero (as of yesterday) Eva Vertes talks about the future of cancer research. Oh and she was only 19 when she gave this talk.

2. Holly Morris talks about what a person's connection to 'home' can mean--and why it makes a group of women live in Chernobyl.

3. Iwan Baan: Ingenious homes in unexpected places.

4. And finally, in a classic but wonderful TEDTalk, David Christian tells the history of the world in 18 minutes.

What about you? What's your favorite TEDTalk? Don't forget to tell me something great that happened to you today!

weekly wishes + tedtalks + shark hearts

Hello nuggets! First off, can we just admire this picture (source)? Look at the purple in those clouds! Gorgeous. Secondly, I hope your weekend has been full of good food and fun! I had one of the best weekends I've had in a long time. It included winning a soccer game, lots of design, some really good deep talks with H and actually being productive for once.

Last week (aka like three weeks ago), I made a goal to come up with ten new ideas for blog posts. Well, ladies + gents, I'm just a blog brainstorming bombshell because I actually came up with twenty-six new ideas. That's right. Granted they're not all really solid ideas, but there's six or seven posts that I'm really excited for. So now you have a reason to stick around (well, and my lovely face)!

I didn't use my gratitude journal at all, but I feel like I've been doing better about keeping schoolwork in perspective. Oh, I'll still complain; I'll find something worth complaining about in anything if you give me enough time. But I'm grateful for the work, really, I am.

This coming week, I will watch a TEDTalk every day. I did this a few months ago and it was really, really a lovely goal. I loved sharing my favorites with you at the end of the week + I think you all enjoyed it as well. So I'll plan to do that this week again. Do any of you watch TEDTalks? Care to make some recommendations?

Science Bit of the Day

WARNING! Don't click on this if you get grossed out easily, because it's sorta nasty. But for real, grow a pair and click on it, because it's super cool. I just had to warn you. Anyways, I saw this article about a week ago about a shortfin mako shark that got caught in New York (on accident). Two tapeworm taxonomists took the shark + dissected it to look for parasites. What they found is super gross (aka stop reading now, you pansies). They found that two anguilliform fish (aka eels) that normally live out in open water, had just been chilling out in the shark's heart. While it was still alive. Yeah, I know, nasty. But kinda freaky awesome too. You should go look at the picture and congratulate yourself for being a strong-willed human being.