Dear People Who Recline Their Seats on Airplanes

Dear People Who Recline Their Seats on Airplanes,

Congratulations! You found a button that magically made your seat more comfortable!  You should win an award! You’re essentially Christopher Columbus!  But have you ever thought about the person behind you who might be trying to work on something.  Maybe, just maybe, they’re a 6’1” high school student working on their computer trying to do their English homework.  But no, let’s not let them put their computer on the tray table; let’s make them work at a ridiculously uncomfortable angle that requires the neck flexibility of the antichrist because you want three more degrees of back angle so you can “relax.”  Lets take away the two inches of legroom that a kid with long legs already doesn’t have so you can feel comfortable.  Why would you ever think that you are personally entitled to the space in font of the passenger behind you?  When does society ever work like that? When you are waiting in line for something, do you just randomly throw your head back and think that it was your room?  Also, I would rather not look at the top of your head for the entire flight because I'm obviously not going to be able look at my computer.  At least have the decency to ask them or even better… not recline your chair.  Wait whaaa? You might say that’s impossible, how can I sit through a two-hour flight without having my back in a stupidly reclined position?  It’s actually easier than your discovery of this button.  You sit a slightly upward position that is probably good for the posture you don’t have.  Then you do this thing called waiting two hours until you get home and then on your bed you can recline all you want while watching Sunday night football without ruining a kid’s with homework day.

Signed with much love from,

The people who can actually sit through a flight with their seat not reclined

The Rip Van Winkle Project

Making an active effort to keep up with the news is not as important as it seems. Looking back on major events such as the death of Osama Bin Laden, the revolution in Egypt, and the first appearance of Ebola, most important news stories will find their way to people through social media and word of mouth. For this reason, the man who is doing the Rip Van Winkle project’s addiction to the news is not something that one could say is the healthiest addiction. He writes, “Not caring about anything beyond the extent of one’s own front bumper can result in a person who is an egotistical ignoramus and a poor citizen of this representative democracy in which, ideally, all of us participate”(thevanwinkleproject.blogspot.com). Feverishly following every piece of news is not necessarily productive if it causes one to divert too much attention from her own life. Taking more interest in one’s own life and looking out for major national and international events is not the same as “not caring about anything beyond the extent of one’s own front bumper”(thevanwinkleproject.blogspot.com). Rather, paying fair attention to both one’s news and one’s life is like seeing one’s entire car and most of the surrounding road. It is essential to a healthy lifestyle to be self-aware.  For the sake of the health of one’s personal life, no news may be bad but too much news is worse.

Rip Van Winkle Project Response

In the last decades, technology has transformed worldwide communication. At the click of a button, an individual from across the world can communicate with someone on the opposite side of the globe. Most importantly, technology allows people to become more globally aware and informed. In a project based on the story of “Rip Van Winkle” by Washington Irving where excessive alcohol consumption and abuse causes a man to be isolated from his family and friends, “Birdie” attempts to challenge his need to constantly be informed by the news. His determination to cut himself off all of communication is admirable; however, in a society where technology plays a significant role in the lives of every person the project of “Birdie” seems unreasonable. Even if “Birdie” restricts himself from directly receiving information from the newspaper, radio and TV, he will still hear of major events by word of mouth. “Birdie” has asked his friends to help him in his project but the reality is that the world is too interconnected through the Internet and television to avoid the global news. An alternative and more reasonable solution to the news addiction of "Birdie"could have been to limit his exposure to the news to certain times or only through certain mediums because ultimately it is inevitable that "Birdie" be informed of any global crisis. 

A Synthetic Slumber

A year without news would be incredible waste of time. Birdie, the man  conducting the experiment, is interested to know what his life would be like if he were asleep to the world like Rip Van Winkle was for twenty years. The difference between the two is that Birdie is willingly falling “asleep” while Van Winkle was tricked into his comatose state. The reasoning behind the experiment is pure curiosity, but a real Rip Van Winkle sleep would entail no news or contact with anyone since in his sleep he was completely unaware of everything going on around him, even the weath. Imagining life without updates of the world’s current events in this modern world is like trying to live without a car in Los Angeles. That is to say it is nearly impossible, not that many people would even considering attempting it. Birdie is an interesting fellow who decided to try what may be one of the hardest feats in the current age. His attempt at falling “falling asleep” is truly commendable.

"Rip Van Winkled"

Michael Solazzo

10/15/14

Rip Van Winkle Blog

http://goo.gl/D3gP37 

The title of the blog post, “Trying to Reclaim the Old Normal,” presents an interesting concept. The “Old Normal” is essentially last year’s models and styles that still have left an impact on the current culture.  For example, new sayings and new mannerisms that have become common, but were undiscovered a year ago.  The categories used: politics, history, economy, sports and entertainment are the categories of culture that determine peoples’ lifestyles.  No one can no what would be in the parenthesis if they “Rip Van Winkled” themselves in the year 2014.  The speed of progress on Earth is growing exponentially, meaning this experiment could be done over and over with drastically varying results and personal amazments.  The “Old Normal” would be different, more elaborate and extensive.  The shock and awe would increase and eventually it would become hard for the person to reintegrate with their society.  The person could spend the rest of their lives attempting to “reclaim the old normal,” but at that point the old normal might not be worth the time.  It might be better to attack the new lifestyle head on as opposed to trying to retrace history.  The Rip Van Winkle experiment creates the unique opportunity for one to “Sparknote” the past, learning what others already know, instead of living through it. 

10-16-14

Response to being “Van Winkled”

This experiment is surprising for someone to conduct today because it would be very difficult to “stay asleep” with all of the technology and forms of information exchange today. From the improvement of smart phones to the availability of the internet, information can go from one country to another in the matter of seconds. Not to mention, most gas stations, restaurants, gyms, all have tvs in them constantly playing the news. It would be nearly impossible to live one’s life normally without being exposed to any major news. Because of how challenging this would be, one would need a durable support group around him. The author stated how he was going to need to help of others: “I am depending on cooperation from family and friends and colleagues,” (I’ve been Van Winkled). Accordingly this experiment is not only challenging because it requires flawlessness, but because it requires effort from anyone connected to the conductor.

http://thevanwinkleproject.blogspot.com/p/project.html

Birdie or Albert Haley

http://thevanwinkleproject.blogspot.com/2011/09/news-of-lowercase-m-e.html

The secretive nature of Birdie’s identity builds another layer of mystery throughout Birdie’s Blog. Birdie conducted an absurd experiment based off of Washington Irving’s “Rip Van Winkle”. Birdie takes this seemingly fictional story and turns it into reality. In Irving’s short story, Rip Van Winkle finds himself drinking too much alcohol and fading away into a 20 year snooze. After waking up, Rip is surprised by everything that had changed, after all it was 20 years. Birdie, an online blogger, conducted an experiment in which he cut himself off from all information pertaining to his present time. This made Birdie totally oblivious to current issues and news. From the moment he cut himself off from the world to the day he “returned”, birdie’s identity was kept a secret. A couple days after “waking up”, birdie exposes his identity. In the blog post above, he gives an in depth life summary along with news about what he was presently doing. Keeping his identity a secret not only depersonalized the blog, but it also kept readers interested. The mystery of who Birdie really was captured readers attention. This specific blog post was a “historic” moment in the whole blog. Seeing that Birdie was an ordinary local college professor connected the occult blogger with many of his readers. This moment symbolized the era of Birdie “being awake”.

The Van Winkle Project- Undoable with the rising generation

Reading about The Van Winkle Project will leave the readers asking themselves if they could participate in falling “asleep” for a whole year.  Our society today, on the contrary, has become so technologically dependent that it would be a miracle if a person from the current rising generation (anyone born from 1990-2014) could participate in an experiment like this.  The college professor, named Birdie, in his experiment, isolated himself from all news: weather, sports and entertainment.  Birdie’s main reason for participating in this is to cure, as he describes, his relationship to all of these things or his “news addiction”.  He states, “It’s not much of a stretch to say that I’m addicted to the news. Give me newspapers, magazines, reliable websites, and interesting television programming and I’m ready to devour them all” (About me page).  Birdie describes this news addiction as abnormal; however, with this new generation a news addiction is completely normal.  It is very rare to find someone who does not know about the new iPhone, latest football game or the newest dirt on a celebrity.   He describes it as an “insatiable curiosity,” but someone who does not have this is considered out of the norm.  Moreover, especially now a days, technology is advancing at such a rapid pace that someone will be at a huge disadvantage when the “wake up”.  To give an example, five years ago the first iPad came out and now the tablet a common household object.  This advancing is something no one wants to miss out on because of all the innovative products that are arriving faster than ever.  Therefore, with this new generation, an experiment like this would be a remarkable accomplishment.

Van Winkle - Seeing Fiction in a Different Light

            One of the many powerful components of Rip Van Winkle is the way in which the story perfectly paints a picture of the world where Rip lives. It is wonderful how much freedom Washington Irving exercises in this work of fiction. However, while the place Irving depicts is beautiful, picturesque, and to a degree, almost magical, it is not reality. This fact is no secret and while many fiction lovers read fiction because it can take them to the reaches of their imagination, there is one piece that often goes missing. Fiction often lacks the ability to relate to people’s lives to the point where one can picture them experiencing it. In Rip Van Winkle, when Rip returns after 20 years, his experience is without doubt amazing, however, due to the foreign setting and the fact that Rip Van Winkle is in fact fiction, it is difficult to picture oneself in his position. This is why reading “birdie’s” blog post, which describes a present day Rip Van Winkle scenario, is so important to read after reading Rip Van Winkle. While “The Rip Van Winkle Project” obviously cannot compare to Rip Van Winkle in terms of literary importance, “The Rip Van Winkle Project” is able to make one think about the importance of knowledge and how hard it would be to lose all sense of current events by creating a present day Rip Van Winkle scenario. Rather than comparing Washington’s Irving’s timeless and masterful “Rip Van Winkle” to a blog post, it is important to read both to get the fully appreciate the story.

The Van Winkle Project--insight on the effects of technology

A privilege people have nowadays is being able to know every piece of news around the world with a push of a button. Taking that away is like taking a compass or GPS away from a traveler. Without them, humans are lost and ignorant. In order to achieve this great of a goal of the “Van Winkle Project,” Birdie must have a lot of motivation to be able to let go of something he is so used to and something that is so imbedded into our culture. Time flies by, and people are not aware of just how fast it goes. So much happens in a year, and Birdie’s project is a good way of seeing just how much the new technology has affected the citizens of the world. The author speculates about what will happen while he is “asleep” and writes, “In the absence of facts and information, am I able to read clues as to what has happened in people’s behavior or from a subtle but detectable buzz in the air?” (Birdie). This questions sparks up other questions that might have been answered when he “woke up,” giving insight on the effects of technology in people’s lives.