Google Timer Tech Tip

This is a really cool feature Google has that I definitely need to take more advantage of! All you have to do is type (or say) "set a timer for _____ minutes/hours" and it starts timing you! Don't worry you can't forget about it either because there is a timer that lets you know when your time is up!

I think I am going to use this more often while I do homework. I have this terrible habit of getting distracted by music, T.V., people, etc. I think knowing I am being timed and need to get done before the timer goes off will help keep me more focused.

Side note, I've noticed that listening to instrumentals or coffee house music helps me focus more than listening to music I know. I hope these tips help some of you like they did me!

Also, ladies please enjoy this motivating message from Ryan Gosling.

(Konnect: effective time management motivation)

Story Planning: The Green Eyed Monster

(Sarabha saving the king)

I want to write a story about greed as a person. I’d like to have greed be the narrator maybe and talk about some of the instances where he has overtaken people such as the king in the sabala story. I want to include other stories we’ve read this semester as well. I think since it is all about greed when a person gets consumed with greed have their eyes turn green. I want to research through all the stories I have read so far and find the instances where greed consumed a character. I then need to really analyze those characters and find out everything they gave up. In the end I want to have Sarabha break Greed’s winning streak of overpowering people till they eventually end or waste their lives.

Styles:

Here in Oklahoma- This would be fun but I am afraid I’d change too much of the stories I am planning on retelling that my peers from class wouldn’t recognize them. However, it would be a very relatable story since everyone is so familiar with campus.

Stories for children- This would be fun to do since I got the idea of writing this story while reading a children’s book. At the same time though my readers are college students so I don’t know how much they’d be interested in that.

Courtroom Trial- I think this would be a really great setting for my story. Mainly because I am reviewing all the instances where Greed was responsible for someone’s death or loss of everything. Maybe the characters that died I could have their ghosts come back and speak as witnesses against Greed. I could even have one of my old characters, Detective Meena, come back to prove Greed is guilty.

Character sketch:

Greed: boastful, arrogant

Sarabha: wise, beautiful, strong

Pictures:

I want to find photos that really show the characters filled with greed. I think that would make the photo of Sarabha helping the king even more powerful.



Bibliography: My reading notes and The Sarabha

Reading Notes: Twenty Jataka Tales (B)

• I like the sounds used in The Two Pigs, tic-a-tac, crack, crack! I'd like to do something like that in my stories.
• What if the pigs were found by the king instead of the little old woman? would their lives have been the same?
• What if the two men and the mother fell asleep after drinking and then the house caught on fire. It be neat to see the pigs somehow save them!
• The patient buffalo would be a good story to tie in with another story to teach a character about patience.
• It seems that greed has played a role in a lot of stories I have read this semester. I like how in the end of Sarabha the King was saved from his crazy greed before it killed him. Maybe I could write a story that ties this in with the story of the king and sabala the magic cow?

(Sarabha saving his enemy, the King)

• What if I could write a story through the eyes of the goblin women and talk of all the men they've captured?
• I wonder if there is a good way to end The Great Elephant without him dying?
• Maybe the quail could make a trap for the villager and ask him to stop hunting them?
• Size doesn't always matter! 

(Baby quail blowing out the forest fire)

• What if I tied in the forest fire story with the end of the world? After the hare had cried wolf it'd be interesting to see how everyone reacts to him when there actually is a problem.
• Maybe I could mix the noble horse story in with the Pandavas and the Kauravas story?

Bibliography: Twenty Jataka Tales by Noor Inayat, 1939

Reading Notes: Jataka Tales (A)

(Monkeys and their beloved fruit)

• Of course the Ganges is related to the giant monkeys
• What if there was a story where the goddess of the ganges got upset at the monkeys and tried drowning them?
• what if the fisherman that found the fruit just discarded it because he found in in the ocean?
• What if someone walked in on the exact dogs tearing apart the chariot straps so the king wouldn't have said all dogs everywhere should be killed.
• What if the chief dog couldn't talk with humans? how would he have shown the king the truth?
• I know it supposed to be a children's story but what if the King was never told the gold deer had came to the killing stone? What would have happened if the king had eaten him?
• Why did these geese want to take the tortoise with them? Just because they were friends?
• What if the tortoise landed in the kings pond and survived. The tortoise could teach the king about being wise with his words.

Bibliography: Inayat. Twenty Jataka Tales 

Tech Tip: Weather Widget

Hey friends! I added a weather widget to my blog! It is pretty cool, and if you want to try and do the same to your blog click here for instructions! It was more simple than I thought it would be. Enjoy!

Reading Notes: Sacred Cow, Rishyasringa, Sakuntala (B)

(Sakuntala looking back at King Dushyanta)

• I wonder what would have happened if the king didn't put his arrows up but killed the fawn? would the hermits have cursed him?
• Why did the king leave his wife in the grove? Shouldn't he had taken her with him?
• What if Sakuntala took the fawn with her? Would the king have had it killed?
• What if Sakuntala had a power where when she touches someone she could have them see a selected memory of hers?
• Maybe I could write a prequel to this story to tell the powers of the kings ring?
• A story even from the eyes of Sakuntala would be interesting. 
• It'd be interesting to know what all happened to Sakuntala when some god came out of the sky and took her away. Was the purpose of the boy's amulet to find the father or what?
• I love how this story had a happy ending!

Bibliography: The Indian Story Book- Story VIII Sakuntala

Reading Notes: Sacred Cow, Rishyasringa, Sakuntala (A)

•  What if instead of Visvamitra having to travel to find someone to fight there was a neighboring kingdom that wanted to fight him for some strange reason?
• I wonder what would have happened if the king left when he wanted instead of giving in to the sage's demands that he stay?
• Wow I was not expecting Sabala to provide an army that large! It'd be interesting to tie Sabala into the Pandu story somehow. 
• So sad all his sons turned to ash! What if he bargained with the sage that he would leave them alone forever if Sabala brought back his sons?
• What if Visvamitra was the Queen. I wonder if she would have acted out so wildly to make Sabala hers?
• It'd be interesting to see through the eyes of the woman who is trying to convince King Visvamitra to enjoy life and stop living it so harshly.
• what if instead of sending down women to Visvamitra they sent men? Maybe one of his deceased sons? 

(Sabala and her loving owner)

• The way that Rishyasringa grew up reminded me of Tarzan! That'd be an interesting story!
• What if instead of being able to curse people he made them switch bodies? Or put them in random places of the earth?
• What if Rishyasringa was mute? after all he had never talked or interacted with anyone other than his father. 
• What if a woman was sent to talk to the father and was able to warm his heart from all that hatred?

(Rishyasringa's first encounter with women)

Bibliography: The Indian Story Book- Story VII Sabala, The Sacred Cow and Story IX The Great Drought about Rishyashringa