iPhone 4S

I caved.
I did it, I couldn't hold back any longer. I got the new (but now old) iphone 4s! I was due for an update with my phone contract and I thought, hey why not get an iPhone? So I did! ...Well there was a lot more thought that went into it then that, but its pretty much the jist of it.
I love it though! It has proven to be very useful in my field of work. One of the main reasons I decided on the iPhone was particularly for that. Having to regulate between social media, emails and general everyday duties the iPhone really couldn't be a better fit.
The only problem I've found with it so far is the notifications. Now, I don't know if this is just because its the weekend and there isn't much activity going on, but I found that my HTC Desire was much better at notifying me when I got a new email or when I get mentioned on twitter. It's still the first week with it though, and maybe Monday things will pick up. Not all hope is lost yet.
As a whole though I am very pleased with it! I even did this post from my phone :). My only hope is that it doesn't become too out of date now that the new and improved iPhone 5 is out. I looked into it though and apparently it's pretty much the exact same but with a longer body. There's probably more then that, but that's all I noticed.

I've really been loving the camera as well. Now that I have so much more storage on my phone (16GB), I can feel free to take as many pictures as I want! Instagram's going to loveeeeee me. 

Here's one of the pictures I took today walking home from campus. You can really tell that fall is here! It's my favourite time of year, but it's so short lived...

This is my lion. Poor guy can't find love. 

X

Sarah

Mr. Bee's Tip of the Week: Easy-to-do tricks to keep your room clean

Due to the new room renovations, I've been looking for ways to keep my room the way it was when I was finished. We all want to sustain that "just cleaned" look, but are really just drowning in a sea of all our clothes. Yah, it happens. 

Luckily I've come up with this easy-to-do system for keeping my room in tip top shape. This is what you have to do:

PUT ITEMS YOU WANT GONE ON YOUR BED.

These are the things you are going to be putting away. 

Simple enough right? Right. It's your job however, to actually put these items away. Now, it's completely up to you when you want to do this, but at the end of the night, the only way you're allowed access into those comfy sheets of yours is if you put everything that's on your bed away first. Depending on the day this may not be very much, if anything at all. You can only get into bed though, once everything is gone. In refection it's very logical because you can't get into a bed with a bunch of stuff on it anyway... so, you might as well clean it up!

How do I make myself do it?

compromise.  

See all of those clothes you still have on the floor? Leave 'em there.

Only put away the items that are on your bed. Now, this doesn't give you an excuse to throw everything from your bed to the floor and never touch them again. Oh, no. This means that you can pick. You can choose from the clothes or objects on the floor and pick which ones to throw on your bed. How great is that? All you have to do is the little bend and toss from the floor to the bed. With this you get some procrastination time (not actually putting it away until before bed), and productivity (knowing that it's actually going to get done later). Whatever is left on the floor at this point is left for tomorrow's pickings. Over time, all this procrastinating-productivity adds up and you've got a clean room!    

X

Sarah

Painting Pleasures: Redoing your ugly university room

My main goal this summer was to redo my room. I don't know what it was, but there was just something about that red, blue, orange and beige combo that just wasn't doin' it for me. So, I began my quest for the perfect shade of white.

Naturally I wanted to get the cheapest paint I could, but after speaking with someone who actually knew what they were doing, I decided against it. It completely paid off too, because I only ended up doing one coat of both the primer and the paint! Trust me if this is ever an option, take it. You do not want to be doing any more coats of paint then you have to.

These are some pictures of what it looked like before:

BEFORE

Yah, something had to be done.
So, I went to work and just started painting.

I've never painted a room by myself before, so it was kinda of exciting figuring it all out. It's really not that hard either. All you need is the time to do it. That was the hardest part for me anyway. Another thing too is if you are in a hurry and under any sort of time constraint, use good paint. Only having to do one coat of each paint will gain you SO much time in the long run.

The way I did it was I would work on my room for a few hours a day (or night), so it took me about 2 or 3 nights to completely finish it. My schedule was still pretty full during that time, so I would dedicate a few hours here and there to painting, and was finished in no time! Mind you, I also had to spend a couple nights in my roommates room, so if you are planning on painting your bedroom, make sure you have somewhere else to sleep. Paint fumes aren't good air fresheners. I was lucky because she was away for the weekend, so I just took her bed. If no one else is gone though, you might have to end up sleeping on the couch. At least your pets might appreciate the company!

And here we have the finished product! Needless to say, it turned out much better then before.

AFTER

X

Sarah

Mr. Bee's Tip of the Week: Understanding F-stops and Shutter Speeds

Starting out as a photographer is hard. For me the hardest part is learning all about the f-stops and shutter speeds and light and dark, blah blah blah. I'm still working on it myself, but by practicing and just playing around with it I've found this little trick. Now, it's nothing super secret and most of you may have already discovered it, BUT what I like to do is keep the video turned on while I'm adjusting the different settings. I have a Canon T3, which allows me to do that in any of the settings, be it for photo or video. By leaving the video on before I take a picture I can see the immediate changes I make when trying to set up the picture. If I start playing around with the f-stop then I can see exactly what that does to the picture as I do it. Same thing goes for changing the shutter speed, I can see how light or dark it's going to make the picture before I even take it. This has helped me tremendously in my process of trying to understand the confusion that is a DSLR camera. I've found that the two main photo adjustments to make are with the f-stop and the shutter speed. This is because they are the ones that revolve completely around how much light you will be letting into the lens/camera. For me lighting is the hardest part of taking a picture. I'm still in the learning process myself (as any of my roommates will tell you), so I don't have any tricks for that yet. I plan on finding some though, so stay tuned. 

This is a picture I found on Google that I though was a really good way to show how the f-stops (aperture) works. The thing to remember, but is also really confusing is THE SMALLER THE NUMBER, THE LARGER THE LENS OPENING. Confusing, I know.

It looks like this:

small f-stop = lots of light, more things in focus, larger depth of field

big f-stop = little light, less things in focus, smaller depth of field



x
Sarah

Pabst Blue Ribbon with Steak

Yah, this is what my day consisted of on Saturday. Needless to say, it was a good night. Not going to lie, the only reason I got this beer, besides it being on sale, was because it's in a Lana Del Rey song "Pabst Blue Ribbon on ice"... I felt as cool as it sounds. The taste was pretty good too. It's not a strong bitter taste, which is good because I'm not really one for dark or super bitter beers. So all-in-all it was a success and I give it two thumbs up for coolness factors.  

Sesame seed steak strips

I was having one of those "I'm feeling a down and want to eat away my sorrows" kind of moment, when all of the sudden I hear a "do you want any steak" come from the kitchen. I've never had my worries cured so fast in my life. NOT ONLY did my amazing roommate give me the steak, but she had delivered it to my wilting chamber of sorrows (my room). Then it turned into "this is why I love my roommates" moment. Moral of the story? Have an issue? Eat some steak. 

A South Korean Summer Vacation

This summer my family and I went on a huge trip across the world to visit my sister who is teaching in South Korea. We went at the beginning of August and stayed for 2 weeks. Not only is this the longest my family has gone on a trip, but it's also the first time we've all gone on the plane together. We were excited. 

Stoked faces for takeoff 

The flight takes a full 24 hours to get all the way over there. There were 3 connecting flights that we took too. We went from Halifax to Toronto (2 hours), Toronto to Vancouver (5 hours), and then from Vancouver to Incheon, Korea (14 hours). We flew with Air Canada and I was actually super impressed by the service and timing and everything, which is surprising I know. But we got cool airplane food because we were an over night flight and we also got to have the snack for free too! Drinking red wine and eating Lindor chocolate was probably the highlight of the flight.  

My sister had Korean beer, noodles and dried squid at the ready when we arrived at her apartment. All things which I later found out to be VERY common amongst the streets of Korea. I gave in on the last day and tried some of this so called dried squid, and let me tell you, it was disgusting. Mind you, I don't like seafood anyway, but it actually was pretty gross. Dad didn't mind it though, so maybe there are some people out there who would like it. All I know is that I don't. 

We did A LOT while we were there too. Now, I know some of you might be saying, what is there to do in South Korea? WELL my friends, there's lots. We were there for a total of two weeks, did something every day and could have easily filled up another two. First we started out with a tour of Seoul and the Palace, then we went to Seoul Tower another day and got a 360 degree view of the whole city (really beautiful with an unexpected amount of big mountains surrounding the city.), we went to the school where my sister teaches, and went to an aquarium that was inside of an underground mall named Cotex. Yah, I said underground mall. These are only some of the activities we did too, other days were spent shopping, walking around, museums and lots drinking. 

The best things about the Korea trip as a whole, was the fact that everything was super cheap, all the translations were terrible and you can buy liquor at pretty much any store. I'm making myself sound like an alcoholic here, but there is just something about buying a 2,000 won ($2.00), beer at Family Mart (equal to Needs here), grabbing a table, and sitting out in public drinking with your friends and family. I think Canada could take a few hints from these guys, they're on to something.  

In addition to all the other things we did over the past coupe weeks, we also went to a baseball game and went to the UMF music festival to see Skrillex and Steve Aoki. The Baseball was amazing, with people cheering literally the entire time. It was like nonstop background noise with loud thunder sticks and choreographed dance moves. 

The concert was nothing short of amazing either. My friends made me bring their pictures so that they could be a part of the excitement too. I was happy to have the company. Skrillex seemed pretty excited too. You know it's a good concert when you leave having a different color shirt then the one you came with. I swear I danced so hard I will never have to exercise again. Worth it. 

The fashion there is another thing all in itself. It was such a shock being from Canada, a culture where women don't really dress up unless you have to, to Korea where the girls wear 4 inch heels to go to Family Mart. Everyone dresses very respectfully and always look presentable. I didn't wear pants the whole time I was there because A) it was wayyyyy to hot, and B) you almost feel as if you have to. I love dressing up though, so for me it was just an opportunity to wear all the dresses getting dusty in the closet. Another thing too is that because there's so many people there, anything goes. I could have worn anything and it would have been fine. I may have gotten a couple stares, but no more then the regular ones you get for being a non-Korean. There may be a lot of people, but there isn't much diversity. 

I actually kind of liked being the minority for once. As a Caucasian female I don't really get to experience that very much. By the end of the two weeks the stares and lack of personal space were getting to be a bit much, but all in all being in Korea was an experience I won't soon forget.    

X

Sarah