I got back last Friday from my five-and-a-half-week summer program in Raleigh. It was amazing: I learned a ton, met several wonderful people, and gained a lot of experience with living in a college setting.
There were really strict policies about using our cell phones and laptops. I, a seventeen-year-old blogger, am about as addicted to technology as anyone you know, so that was a struggle for me at first (which is why I have been a bit MIA here on the blog). But by the end of the first week, I was getting pretty used to handwriting everything and thinking before Googling.
It wasn't until I got back home and didn't look at my laptop very much or even know where my phone was half the time that I realized my thought process had changed a bit. It reminded me of an article by Nicolas Carr for The Atlantic that I had read earlier in the year. Carr mentions how the way in which people write determines a lot about what they write. I would argue that the ways in which people read, learn, interact, and write all influence what they read, learn, say, or write. For instance, I write a lot more quickly and thoughtlessly when I type, where as each handwritten word is more thought out. Similarly, I think about what I am going to say more when I am emailing or texting than when I speak in person. This also relates to a discussion often had in my English class at the summer program where we talked about how the style something is written in can say as much as the content of what is written. It's certainly cool to think about.
All this makes me wonder: how can individuals get ideas across differently or more powerfully through different means? Like, if a variety of teaching methods help different students pick up information, then can't different tactics help bring about more awareness to a larger group of people?
That's a lot of the reason I blog. While I love cooking, photographing and blogging as hobbies, blogging is a format to convey information that can be very powerful in leading people to question their habits and change how they cook, eat, and maybe even live.
There were really strict policies about using our cell phones and laptops. I, a seventeen-year-old blogger, am about as addicted to technology as anyone you know, so that was a struggle for me at first (which is why I have been a bit MIA here on the blog). But by the end of the first week, I was getting pretty used to handwriting everything and thinking before Googling.
It wasn't until I got back home and didn't look at my laptop very much or even know where my phone was half the time that I realized my thought process had changed a bit. It reminded me of an article by Nicolas Carr for The Atlantic that I had read earlier in the year. Carr mentions how the way in which people write determines a lot about what they write. I would argue that the ways in which people read, learn, interact, and write all influence what they read, learn, say, or write. For instance, I write a lot more quickly and thoughtlessly when I type, where as each handwritten word is more thought out. Similarly, I think about what I am going to say more when I am emailing or texting than when I speak in person. This also relates to a discussion often had in my English class at the summer program where we talked about how the style something is written in can say as much as the content of what is written. It's certainly cool to think about.
All this makes me wonder: how can individuals get ideas across differently or more powerfully through different means? Like, if a variety of teaching methods help different students pick up information, then can't different tactics help bring about more awareness to a larger group of people?
That's a lot of the reason I blog. While I love cooking, photographing and blogging as hobbies, blogging is a format to convey information that can be very powerful in leading people to question their habits and change how they cook, eat, and maybe even live.
Okay, back to the recipe. I used to be a big an of pesto, but I don't really like pasta (gasp!). This recipe is a perfect solution though: it combines the delicious flavor of pesto with the creamy texture of avocado and the cool crunch of cucumbers. It may not be super colorful but I assure you that it tastes amazing. In fact, I had a hard time holding myself back from eating them all while trying to take these photos. Let me know what you think!
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| Avocado Pesto Ingredients:
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| Cucumber 'Bruschetta' Bites Ingredients:
Directions:
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