Friday, May 29, 2015

Belt Buckles




I recently got a belt that I can use belt buckles with. I got this bat one with the belt. I've been wearing it so much the past few weeks. I'm pretty sure the one here is identical, if you want to buy one.

This beetle one is huge and awesome, but not only was it super expensive, I don't think it is made anymore. It's a whopping 9 inches long - that's one way to make your belt feel looser!

Here is another beetle belt buckle that is only $16 and is in stock! It's not as big and unique, but it's still pretty cool.

Check out this angry unicorn! I don't think I've ever seen a unicorn look so badass. 


I saved the best (or the worst, depending on your tastes) for last. I'm really digging the slobbery look of the teeth. It is totally a nightmare come to life in a wearable form.

And here is another artist doing a similar thing with eyeball belt buckles. Not quite as creepy as the one above, but this one is reminiscent of A Clockwork Orange.

I am so happy I got this belt. I can finally buy my atom bomb belt buckle that I have been wanting for a while. You can check out that buckle in this post. I've also been looking at wallet belt buckles to reduce the need for a bag, but I haven't found any that I think look that good. If you have any suggestions tell me.



Monday, May 25, 2015

Bodhi Leather Bags 80% off on Zulily!! + gifts for Dad

I first discovered Bodhi a few years ago while I was on the lookout for a silver glitter handbag. I really wanted a Furla Candy like this one from Lord & Taylor but I'm not in the position to drop $250 on a bag that I don't plan on using often. At the time the Bodhi bag was a bit too pricey for my taste as well. Today it is only $39 on Zulily, over 80% off the original price tag of $198!!

Unfortunately it seems that Bodhi has stopped producing handbags which is why they are now on Zulily. Bodhi used to be sold at fine retailers like Lord & Taylor and Neiman Marcus. They were well known for their Safety Clutch which featured a giant safety pin on its top. You can get glimpse of them here on Purseblog. I wish I could tell you that they have some on Zulily but sadly the Safety Clutches are long gone. Thankfully you can still snag a few other pieces at ridiculously low prices before Bodhi is nowhere to be found.

For those who haven't heard, Zulily is a flash sale site targeted towards women, parents and grandparents. They sell clothing (mostly women's and children's), gear and toys at a discounted price. Each sale lasts a given amount of time, usually a few days to a week. Once you join you can earn a $15 credit towards a future purchase for every referral. If you are new and plan on joining Zulily please consider following my link - www.zulily.com/invite/1142km, I'd really appreciate it! 

Body Glitter Jelly Speedy - $39 on Zulily


This is the handbag that I have been dreaming about for awhile. I am trying to simplify my life to some extent but I am going to make room for this. I have silver glitter cups from Target and they are just about one of my favorite things. It's glitter, but the silver color makes it understated enough that I think I can totally get away with it without looking like a fruit loop. It is also available in gold, which is just as lovely.


These streamlined essentials would make great gifts for Father's day, which is coming up in less than a month on June 21st. The polyester construction of this brief case is lightweight yet durable. Recently I bought a similar one for my hubby by Fossil and he just loves it!

Dopp bags are one of the things that most guys think they can live without, but once they have one it just makes life so much easier. Especially helpful for those who travel often. 


Water and Stain Resistant Dopp Bag - $35

                     Slim Briefcase - $45

Mini green and tan bags are so femme without even using pink. The vintage styling of the teal bag reminds me of something straight from Modcloth, but higher quality. The tiny mint bag is just classic, there is a version with white trim as well.


Adjustable Chain Shoulder Bag - $36
"Julep & Taupe Crossbody Bag" - $54

















These leather minaudere are such a fun way to finish an outfit. They would easily add a little bit of fun to your look. Mixing colors and prints is so haute. I can see the blue one looking great with a grey dress. The watermelon polka dot clutch would be stunning with marigold.

I naturally gravitate to the teal striped clucth, but it could look a bit witchy if you're not careful. I bought something else in a similar pattern and I ended up getting rid of it because it felt too Halloween-y lol.

Ladybug Minaudiere - $30




Hope that everyone had a great Memorial Day weekend. Big hugs and respect to all of our soldiers out there.

 <3 KM

Friday, May 22, 2015

Skeletal


I know winter is over, but I am still interested in knits. I am having a minor obsession with skeletal patterns. This dress above is so dragon priestess. Now I will think of long reptilian tails whenever I see a train on a dress.

The skulls rolling their eyes are what drew me to this dress. I like that it is not the typical rib-cage print dress.


I found this nifty fish skeleton. If I didn't have so many half finished projects I would make a hat with this pattern on it.

Tuesday, May 19, 2015

Say Hello to the Robots Who Are Taking All of Our Jobs

Ever since I watched Humans Need Not Apply a few months back I have been wanting to talk to everyone about robots taking over our jobs. More often than not people seem to shy away from the topic and I end up feeling like the weird robot obsessed lady. I am far more concerned than I am offended. Even Bill Gates thinks that this is the real deal.

When speaking about robots most people seem to like to talk about scary robots and the robot-apocalypse more than comparatively mundane robot issues. What will we do when we don't need basic workers anymore? How will we support ourselves, and our communities? Shouldn't we be having these conversations now before we face another economic collapse?



I imagine that there are certain countries and cultures that will stick to the "old ways" due to lack or funds and materials but I imagine that most "first world" countries will continue to race each other throughout the robotic revolution. Japan and China seem to be ahead of the United States right now as far as integrating robots into daily life. Many of the robots showcased below come from Asia, however there are a few from the US in the mix.

Speaking of China, with 1.357 billion people living there, how do they manage to keep the employment rate so low (4.6% v. the United States 7.4% - Worldbank)? I'm guessing that the bulk of it has something to do with all of the stuff that is made in China, however according to AT0086 Electronic Information processing is on the rise.

Anyways back to the robots! Here are some of the awesome robots that are currently doing our work for us, across all industries.

Waiter Bots

Waiter bots in Ningbo, China

Personal Chefbot


The countertop robot Sereneti is programmed to cook whatever you'd like. All you have to do is insert the fresh ingredients. The company sells pre-chopped ingredients making the whole process nearly as convenient as fast food. Once you are finished eating all that you need to clean is the bowl and spatula! You can even program your own recipes or those of your loved ones.

Robot Barista 


This Robobarista learns as it brews so that it can use new and unusual coffee makers. So cool!


Robotic Coffee Kiosk - Briggo (Austin, TX)



The robotic Briggo kiosk is currently housed in Dell's Austin, TX building. It would be so great to see more of these around. They kind of remind me of the old school coffee vending machines that drop your cup into place and fill them. Briggo coffee orders are far more customizable. The robot utilizes fresh milk rather than the powdered stuff due to its complex mechanics.


Companion Bots:


Jibo is a social, adorable robot that can order take out, take family photos and even read bedtime stories. A step towards an actual nanny robot. Jibo is more adorable than creepy, but there are some others that are a bit borderline creepy such as the human looking companion bots in this BBC article entitled Step Inside the Secret Robot House by Zoe Kleinman.

Customer Service Bots


Ever get lost in the hardware store? The OSHbot robot store helper from Lowe's Innovation labs can direct you to whatever you may need. Is it just me or does it seem much less intimidating to ask a robot for help rather than a person?

Merchandising Robots



These Amazon Robots are already used to fulfill orders at lightning speed. I wondered how they can possibly afford to include 2 day shipping for all Prime members!

House/ Hotel Cleaning Robots




Speaking of Amazon, you can find these souped up versions of iRobots' vacuums and mop bots on Amazon.com. These are affiliate links, by the way. I am very tempted to buy one myself!

Farmer Robots

Cucumber picking robot from Gizmodo article linked below
Machines have been important for farming for generations. The line between machine and robot can be blurry. Here are some seriously sophisticated robots working hard to provide us with fresh fruits and veggie fuel. 13 Fascinating Farming Robots That Will Feed Humans of the Future - Gizmodo


Author/ Writer/ Blogger Robots

"Would you read a news article penned by an algorithm? If you follow financial or sports news, maybe you already have." Ani Minoff Rise of the Bot Author
Software programs are totally capable of writing articles, providing a synopsis of events and even writing poetry.


Robot Drivers aka Self Driving Cars


Front quarter view_V2
Image from Google 

Self driving cars have been causing quite a stir lately. I think that they are a great idea, but I can see them working best in an environment in which all cars are self driven. Here is Google's Plan to Eliminate Human Driving in 5 Years as told by Alex Davies of Wired.

Nurse Robots

Robear as featured on Digital Trends
Robear is a step closer to a real like Baymax. I think it would be great to have a "personal healthcare companion" like Baymax but I'm not so sure about the bear yet.

Teacher robots

Telepresence robot - photo by Nichole Dobo of What It's Like to Have a Robot for a Teacher
Thomas Fetch teaches a high school social studies class in a blended classroom in Ohio from his home in Arizona. The telepresence robot allows him to speak to students more normally as he would in a face to face situation.

https://www.aldebaran.com/en/more-about
Nao is a robot that can teach children programming through direct experience because it is fully programmable. Nao can be programmed to teach lectures. According to this RobotsLab video Nao is considered "the best educational robot available today".


Artist Robots



e-David is an artistic robot  uses cameras, five different brushes and 24 different paint colors to capture beauty on canvas. "Though it may seem counter-intuitive, the University Konstanz team didn’t develop e-David to make a better robotic painter. Instead, they built the robot painter to learn more about the techniques human artists use." - Ian Chant author of Meet e-David, the Painting Robot That is More Artistic Than You Are

Musician Robots



The robot band Z-Machines can create some truly beautiful music. The band consists of March the guitarist, Ashura the drummer, and Cosmo the keyboardist. You can read about them more in Sheena McKenzie's CNN article entitled Meet the robot guitarist with 78 fingers and coolest cable hair you've ever seen.

Conclusion


These robots are just the tip of the iceberg. There is so much wonderful technology being developed as we speak which is both frightening and comforting. It would be nice to have a more relaxed job atmosphere due to robot assistance but the thought of thousands losing their livelihood is pretty scary.

Having robots everywhere is totally a step closer to Big Brother's level of super surveillance as well. Equipped with voice recorders and cameras robots are capable of detecting your every move. It would stink if they took weird pictures of you and then someone hacked into them and stole the pictures. On the other hand I wonder if we'll ever need to figure out how to determine robot's rights and what to do about robot jail.

Hope that you all are having a captivating week so far!

<3 KM

Friday, May 15, 2015

Sea Urchin

I was with KM this past weekend and I made her eat Uni. Uni is the Japanese word for sea urchin roe. She didn't like it very much. It is my man's favorite and I like it quite a bit, too, so I thought it might be worth a shot. 

Anyway, I thought it might be fun to see what kind of fashions incorporate this spiny little fellow. I was sadly disappointed in my search. All I could really find was the dried shell without spines being depicted. So I did a quick sketch of what I was hoping to find.


I did find these shoes, but even with a reverse image search I could not find the original source. Oh well.

Urchin Necklace 
There are necklaces on Etsy like the one above made from sea urchin spines.



Here is my own collection of spines. I think they are too delicate to turn into a necklace, though. 

Printed Dress
 I am usually more a fan of the spines than the shell, but this 3D printed dress incorporates the sea urchin shell in a way I enjoy. On second thought, it might just be a floral design that my mind is reading as "sea urchin."

Monday, May 11, 2015

Music Spotlight - The Dandelion Deadbeats #newfavorite

Described as, "Death Pop/ Polite Punk" The Dandelion Deadbeats are just my style - Pop/Punk with a bit of Ska. They are joining my list of top favorites along with the Unicorns and Pixies. The only downside is that they live in Bergen, Norway which is pretty far from Portland, OR. Norway is totally on my bucket list but I bet that they would do really well touring over here. Just sending that out to the Universe. 



Oh how I wish I knew how to play guitar this precisely - maybe one day. This video is fun to watch, matches the music perfectly and it is brilliantly simple.



This is the song that first got my attention. <3 the sound and I had to click on it once I saw Converse. One of the many keys to my heart.



This song sounds totally different in each version. This is the rockin' version, perfect for your garage punk/emo/grunge/hipster party.



This acoustic version is chill and calm. Perfect hide-away-from-the-world music.


One of my favorite things about the Dandelion Deadbeats is the balance between bright/cute sounds and soulful/sad lyrics, especially prominent in this song.

If you are a fan I highly suggest that you follow The Dandelion Deadbeats on Soundcloud. They seem to post a lot of new tunes on there. Speaking of Soundcloud if you haven't followed me yet, I would love to be friends :).

Hope that you all are having a beautiful start to your week. I know I am really looking forward to the summer, bring it on!

<3 KM

Friday, May 8, 2015

Creepy Studs


It is pretty hard to find strange earrings. The weirdest you're going to usually get is a dinosaur or a snail. But I have found some pretty strange ones after hours of searching. The weird little bull-men pictured above are my favorite. I'm guessing the open part is supposed to be a nose, but instead it looks like a toothy mouth. And the way the eyes slant inward just adds to these little creepy critters. 

These ones are even advertised as freaky alien earrings. The eyes look sunken and eerie and the weirdly shaped ribs are a nice touch. I like that they aren't the traditional and cliche alien with the egg-shaped head. 



These are advertised as "snowflake" earrings, and I guess if you don't look too close that's what they are. But really they are the symbol for chaos, which ties to the 8 of wands in Crowley's tarot deck. Anything that relates back to Crowley definitely has a creep factor.  

I'm not sure if this guy has a pig nose or if his nose got cut off. The different sizes of the eyes add asymmetry and make him look like he is questioning something. Perhaps he is wondering what demonic curse he will spread on this earth. I think the pockmarks are a cool touch. Are they from the spitting embers of hell, or are they left over from a bad case of acne? 


More tiny earrings here

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Monday, May 4, 2015

Learn to code your site for free with Code Oregon and Treehouse

Like it or not blogging and coding go hand in hand. Html knowledge can be very beneficial when trying to insert embed code, and it is even more important when trying to fix formatting and design issues. Blog hosts such as Blogger and Wordpress provide users with the option of altering the html code for every single post. This gives bloggers the option to tweak the final look of their posts however it can be very intimidating to tackle when your knowledge of html coding is limited.

In the past Google searches have answered most of my basic questions but ultimately still left me frustrated that I didn't fully understand what I was doing. Then one day my hubby introduced me to Treehouse. Treehouse is an affordable code-teaching subscription. The lecture, practice and assessment methods that they use to teach coding is very effective and far more affordable than standard college courses.

What I have accomplished so far.
What exactly do you learn?

Treehouse teaches a wide range of tech skills including HTML, CSS, Wordpress, iOS, Java, JavaScript, Ruby, PHP, Android App Development and Python. At the moment I am focusing on Web Development which is most important for developing websites and blogs. I would love to learn how to code games and apps in the future.

So far I have learned how to create the basic layout of a portfolio website -  from scratch! This is a small feat in the world of programming but it is a big accomplishment for me. I feel like I have already learned a ton in the past week that I have been working on my Treehouse project. I already understand many of the basic formatting issues that were bothering me before but I still have so much to learn to perfect them.

How are lessons taught? 




Once you subscribe to a track you click to begin the track in sequential order. Each lesson builds upon the previous lesson. When you exit Treehouse all of your progress is saved and the site takes you back to the exact place where you left off.

My workspace
Each lesson begins with a video lecture. During the video lecture you can launch your personal workspace which is used to code the assignment as you go. Each section is completed with a code challenge and/or a multiple choice assessment.

Is it hard?

Although coding was pretty intimidating to me at first Team Treehouse does a wonderful job breaking down complicated tasks into simpler ones. Initially I had a hard time remembering to close each tag and quote. One little omission can break an entire line or two or three... of code. It is such a good feeling to finally solve issues though!

Learning html code is much like learning a new language. Some of the words are familiar but the sequencing is completely different. It takes some time to memorize which phrases to use for specific tasks but thankfully Google is filled with answers to most simple questions.

What is the biggest mistake you've made so far? 

One time I accidentally placed my index.html file into the image folder which completely messed up my entire site. Everything was gone! I kept checking and double checking my code to figure out what was wrong but could find no errors. Then I looked into the sidebar of my workspace and noticed that I couldn't find the index.html file. Thankfully I found it in the images folder. Once I dragged it out to it's original position on the sidebar of my workspace everything worked again. Whew!

Pricing

Normally Treehouse is between $25/mo for a Basic account and $49/mo for Pro. If you live in Oregon you can get it for free through Code Oregon. The only catch is that you have to make continual progress or they will shut down your account. Fair enough!

Long Term Benefits

Treehouse could literally change your life. Treehouse offers a Career Program for those willing to commit. Those who manage to complete their chosen track, 3 projects and a few other requirements will be considered for job placement. In my area coding jobs are well paid and on the rise so I'd really like to get into the industry myself.

*****Wishing you all peace and productivity!*****

<3 KM

Friday, May 1, 2015

Transparency



Spring is here are with it comes the rain. The wind rips apart umbrellas and "water resistant" coats are quickly soaked through. Gortex is expensive and has a fairly short lifespan, so what are you going to do? Check out PVC.

It is the only fabric that comes in clear! I think that is pretty nifty. I will never forget the first time I was walking down Sunset Boulevard and a saw a woman wearing a clear coat over her bra and underwear. I don't remember too many outfits for over 10 years without photo evidence. She may have been a hooker, but she was amazing, and I have wanted one of these coats ever since. 



I know some kids these days are forced to carry clear backpacks to school for security reasons, but I still think they look pretty cool. I almost bought one in a tiny regional airport once. I decided against it because I had too much to carry at the time. The next time I was back at that airport the store was completely gone. I mean, there was a cinder-block wall where it once was. I wonder if I imagined the whole thing. 


These boots are completely clear! I think they would make a nice outfit when paired with the clear raincoat. And you can show off your novelty socks. I would probably change the laces, though. I am really against beige. 

If you want to see more clothing utilizing PVC check out KM's post on Plastic Wear.



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