The Roaring 1920′s

If I could live in any other decade in United States history (as the age I am now), it would have to be the 1920′s. It was a decade of immense economic prosperity and social evolution. It was the era of the flapper, speakeasies, jazz, and week-long dance marathons. The 1920′s brought about a wave of revolutionary inventions: the automobile, airplane, radio, film, TV, Vitamin E, and Penicillin. There were significant (and cool) happenings as well: the woman’s suffrage movement, the Harlem Renaissance, Prohibition, the discovery of Tutankhamen’s tomb, the Sacco and Vanzetti Case, and the Scopes Monkey Trial.

If I lived in the 1920′s, you’d to find me dancing the night away to a hot jazz band in a speakeasy with bootleg liquor in one hand a flapper girl in the other. Those were the days… It would be all good and fun until my birthday came at the end of the decade (October 29, 1929 also known as Black Tuesday), the great Stock Market Crash of 1929. Then it wouldn’t be so much fun anymore. But if my grandparents could survive the Great Depression, so could I.

The 1920′s also had the best slang. (Found here and here.) These are some of my favorites:

Applesauce, Bee’s Knees, Cat’s Meow, Cat’s Pajamas, Heebie-Jeebies, Hotsy-Totsy, Real McCoy, Spifflicated, Wet Blanket, Whoopee, Zozzled

I’m trying to bring some of these back. Anyone with me?



- extraordinarIAN

College = Fake Life

I often say that college is not real life. It’s “fake life.” The reason I say that is because, although college is definitely a whirlwind of life experiences that you may remember the rest of your life, many college students live in a bubble. They see the “real world” outside of their personal lives, but they don’t live in it. For example, I’m friends with students that go out to eat every night (sometimes multiple times a day). They don’t understand the value of (their parents’) money. I’ve also encountered students that get drunk all the time and sometimes even show up to class intoxicated. I’m not saying that there aren’t people in the real world that spend money frivolously and go to work buzzed because I know these people exist. But outside of the protective school environment, there are a lot more real repercussions.

What bothers me even more than the overindulgent lifestyles of college students is their sheer lack of awareness of what is going on in the world. The other day I was talking politics with a friend and mentioned Judge Sonia Sotomayor and my friend had no idea who she was. Okay, so maybe it’s a little soon for everyone to recognize her name. But I’ve also talked to college students who have no idea what countries the United States are at war with! That is unacceptable.

The solution? Colleges should not be keeping their students sealed in a bubble that all they need to do is pass tests for four years (some of which don’t even need to do that!). College should teach more vocational training and less highbrow academia. Students need to be educated about what is happening outside of the four walls of the institution. College graduates should be better equipped to succeed in the marketplace than people who didn’t go to college. Otherwise, what’s the point of higher-level education at all? So many students these days are graduating with a degree in B.S. (And I mean that literally.)



- extraordinarIAN

One More Year…

Just this past week, I celebrated my 20th birthday. The way I see things, I have one more year to go. One more year until I’m 21; one more year until I can legally drink; one more year until my last year of school. People are always telling me that I need to slow down and enjoy the time that I’m young, but I can’t. I have always been on the move and have always wanted change from the status quo. It’s not that I’m unhappy, but I just think I will be happier once I’m 21. It might have something to do with the fact that I am the youngest child in my family and the youngest employee at work. I am an ‘old soul’ trapped in a young person’s body and I just want to get out.

Happy birthday to me.



QOD: “You have been warned against letting the golden hours slip by. Yes, but some of them are golden only because we let them slip by.”
- James Barrie