A "driftier" take on art.

My last article I had written about was about turning something that otherwise had no real use into a masterpiece; well for this week's blog I came across something else that has been turned into a masterpiece by Cherri Miele. That something else is driftwood. Like me, you probably don't know what driftwood is. Driftwood is the broken pieces of wood that are found washed up on a beach or riverbank and also can be found floating in the river or sea.

Cherri Miele scours the beaches of her hometown of Baltimore, Maryland for days or even weeks trying to collect as much driftwood as she can for her new pieces. She says "There is so much beauty here in this old wood. I hunt for weeks for it. I feel good about using sustainable goods in my artwork, and I'm so inspired by nature."

When you look at one of her works of art you can't help but wonder where this wood has been. It might have been to places that you yourself had never even heard of. That's why I think that people find her pieces so unique and even amazing. To sum it up, I think that this relates to class because it's just another way to turn something useless into something amazing.

Famous Face Made From Phone Books.

When I was looking for a blog that I found interesting I came across a man, Alex Queral, who turns phone books in to works of art. Now I for one never would have thought that a phone book had any use other than to look up phone numbers, and take up space. His artwork can leave you "breathless with admiration." Also, you have to understand how many painstaking hours he spends making these sculptures, and also that one wrong cut could end in having to start all over again, no matter how close he is to the end. A lot of people appreciate his artwork one because of the end result, and two the base of his artwork is made from recycled materials. Your probably wondering how he came up with the idea of using phone books for sculptures. Alex was out searching for scrap wood to use for his sculpting when he thought that a phone book could be used as a substitute because of the thickness of the phone book. It ended up that he was right. That was back in the mid 90's, since then he has gained a reputation for the famous sculptures he has created.

Alex puts a lot of thought into these sculptures, he doesn't just start carving and hope it comes out to resemble some famous person. He starts off by drawing the face freehand. Then he places this over the used phone book and uses the drawing as a template for carving the image into the pages of the book, and to make sure he doesn't make any mistakes. Alex said, "It can be quite tense work sometimes because it takes a long time to finish and when you cut something away you can't get it back again. Nearing the end of the carving and then suddenly having it ruined by a careless cut can be pretty crushing. You have to start all over again." He currently lives in Philadelphia, and can produce 2 phone book faces a month. Some of his pieces include Barack Obama, Clint Eastwood, John Goodman, and Jack Nicholson.

I thought that this article could relate to class because it shows a way that people can recycle and how recycling can be fun just by adding a touch of creativity.

To watch Alex make on of his faces click this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9OgkRtim_FY

Can I have a... McWedding?

When I first saw this article my jaw literally dropped. Why would anyone in their right minds ever want to have their wedding at a McDonald's? But as I started to read more into it I realized maybe it isn't such a bad idea since people these days are starting to save money because of the economy and a wedding at McDonald's really wouldn't cost as much as a "traditional wedding." But still why would anyone want to get married at McDonald's?

Right now the only place that you can go to have a McWedding, as of now, is at select McDonald's in Hong Kong. And instead of cherries for the couple to eat together and kiss you'll have a french fry to kiss. For McDonald's a McWedding makes total sense, because they say that it may be a special place for some people; they had their first date there, they met there. And now they want to get married here.

The idea for a McWedding is to cut costs and to limit the guest list to around 100 people. At a regular five-star restaurant a table for 10 costs around a thousand dollars. And a typical family would reserve about a dozen tables, the cost of the wedding starts to add up as you can see. If you don't want to have your wedding at McDonald's they also welcome engagement and anniversary parties as well. They even provide the "venue, decorations, guest gifts, audio system and even a MC. It's the budget, fast-food version that appeals to wallets (but maybe not waistlines)."

Treehugger hopes that this is just a passing fad and that young couples will take the time to plan a more greener wedding instead. I thought this related to class because it's a way to save money, even though it is a little bizarre.

8 Facts You Didn't Know About Water.

In the article 8 Facts You Didn't Know About Water it talked about 8 things you probably didn't know about the water. I found this article interesting because of Blog Action Day where each year thousands and thousands of bloggers will blog about one topic. Their goal is to raise awareness about that specific topic. Since today was a big day for bloggers and activists around the world because of Blog Action Day this article was created because the focus this year is water.

Most people already know what an impact it would be if something would happen to our water supply. But most people don't know about the startling facts that Blog Action Day has uncoverd about water over the past few months. The facts are:

1. Ever WEEK, 42,000 people die from unsafe drinking water and living conditions.

2. Students in developing countries lose 443 million school days each year combined because of diseases caused by lack of water, sanitation and unhygenic living conditions.

3. More people have access to cell phones than toilets.

4. The United States, Mexico and China lead the world in amount of bottled water consumption. A US citizen on average will drink 200 bottles of water each year. 17 million barrels of oil are needed to make those bottles and 86% of them won't even be recycled.

5. Organizations are bringing fresh water to developing countries, by not only building wells but also creating building to maintain those wells.

6. The average person uses 465 liters of water per day.

7. By correctly disposing of household wastes we can help keep our rivers and streams from becoming polluted.

8. Communities around the world are saying no to bottled water. By doing this it drastically reduces water bottle waste and saves taxpayers money.

After reading those facts I was pretty shocked. I had no idea how much things really do pile up, and how much of a difference there really is between developed and undeveloped countries. But, I also learned that the small things really do make a difference and if we all pitch in on this it really will make a difference.  I thought that this related to class because we were talking about the differences in developed countries and developing countries. 

Fireflies Disappearing?

Is there actually evidence leading to the disappearance of fireflies? Over the last few years The Museum of Science has found evidence leading to the decline in the firefly population. But so far no one knows if it's true. Right now to prevent fireflies from disappearing they have started a program that will go on for 10 years which will have volunteer citizen scientists start to actually count the number of fireflies. On the third year of the Firefly Watch they will start to map out sightings and info about the bug to find out if they are actually disappearing and if so, why they are.





They way they count fireflies is pretty simple. Each night members of the Firefly Watch go out into their backyards and count the number of lights that blink across their yards. This will help scientists figure out what needs to be studied about the supposed disappearance of fireflies. One of the theories for them disappearing is pollution from humans. People that actually want to see the data collected so far can go onto their website and it will show maps of where and what the conditions were that fireflies have been spotted at.

I chose this article because I just wondered what it would be like to be outside in the summer and there not be any fireflies around ever again. This article relates to class because we were talking about pollution and how it effects the earth and our surroundings. So if pollution is actually a factor in the disappearance of fireflies that just means that eventually some other type of animal could go extinct because of us and the pollutants we put into our environment.



Extinction threat for world's smallest seahorse.

Of course everyone knows about the oil spill earlier this year. But did you know that the world's smallest seahorse may become extinct because of it? The dwarf seahorse's are barely 2 cm tall and only live in the shallow waters of the gulf, they also can be found in the seagrass mats that float in the water. Those mats were burned, by BP, so that the oil didn't wash up on the shore. The oil has also made it merely impossible for the seahorses to survive. Seahorses mate for life and they don't have that much offspring so it makes it even harder for them to regain the amount of seahorses that they had before the spill. The oil could effect reproduction cycles making it hard for seahorses to reproduce considering that males carry the eggs. If it couldn't get any worse for them, they are poor swimmers so it's hard for them to escape to oil-free places.

Project seahorse is a group trying to help save the seahorses from extinction. They say that it is crucial to their survival that BP takes steps to help protect the seagrass in the next few months to avoid any more damage to the seahorse population. Koldwey said "We are urging BP to continue to use booms in the clean-up to isolate the oil slicks. These can be skimmed, left to evaporate, or treated with biological agents like fertilisers, which promote the growth of micro-organisms that biodegrade oil."

I picked this story because it just shows the effect that humans have had on not only the environment but all of the other living things on this earth. If BP hadn't drilled for oil the seahorses wouldn't be facing extinction right now. I think this relates to class because it shows how it is an interdisciplinary project because more than one group of scientists/people need to help to save the seahorses.

About Me.

I'm Carly. Somethings I like are anything involving art. Something that I dislike is camping. Things I would like to learn about in environmental are about being green and respecting the environment. That's about it.