walking next to you...

i know this is unusual, but i am irritated with my...macbook. i just purchased one a few weeks ago and yes, i do believe it was a good investment...but i just can't seem to figure things out...for instance, why my photos refuse to upload. that is currently the big issue. so to make up for my lack of photos, here is something someone posted that i borrowed....

so, roxana really is an interesting name. tonight i decided to type my name into the google search and here is what i found: there is a village called roxana in illinois!!! this place was named after a queen from the netherlands which is amazing because the netherlands is my favorite place in the world. i always knew there was something special about illinois...i mean, it has always just had this special place in my heart...now it makes plenty of sense:) when typing roxana into the search the first thing that showed up was: roxana school district and roxana high school....ahahaha:) so i wikipediad this thing and here is what i learned:

Roxana is a village in Madison County, Illinois, United States. The population was 1,547 at the 2000 census. A majority of the land in Roxana is taken up by the Wood River Conoco-Phillips oil refinery; the refinery was built and originally owned by Shell Oil and has also been owned by Premcor. As of December 2005, the Refinery refines 306,000 barrels of oil per day to produce gasoline, jet fuel, diesel, asphalt, propane and other products, and supplies part of the St. Louis region, Chicago, Indiana and Ohio.

Roxana is considered to be part of the Riverbend or Metro East area, including Alton, East Alton, Godfrey, Rosewood Heights, Bethalto, Wood River, Hartford and South Roxana. Roxana is known for its smell, being located in the midst of four oil refineries. It is also well-known for its bright Christmas lights, lining Illinois Route 111, its main street, throughout the holiday season each year. The zip code for Roxana is 62084.

In 1918, the Shell Oil Company opened its Wood River Refinery in what was then called Wood River Field, an area south of the City of Wood River. As houses began being built close to the refinery, the population there grew to the point that in 1921, this unincorporated area became the incorporated Village of Roxana.

Originally constructed on 336 acres, the refinery now covers 1888 acres, and is the largest in the ConocoPhillips system.

Local lore is that the name Roxana was chosen to honor Queen Roxanne of the Netherlands, inasmuch as the village owed its very existence to state owned Royal Dutch Shell. That seems unlikely, however, as there has never been a Queen Roxanne of the Netherlands. The Dutch monarch at the time was Wilhelmina of the Netherlands. More likely, the town owes its name to Roxana, one of the wives of Alexander the Great.

A Baptist Church was organized in September 1921, and the land where the current First Baptist Church of Roxana now stands at the corner of Tydeman Street and Central Avenue was purchased in early 1922. The first services were held there on December 3, 1922. J.A. Wilson served as the church's first pastor.

A formal Village Hall, called for by a vote for a "Municipal Building," was built on bonds in 1938. It currently houses Roxana's Village President, Treasurer, Water Department, and Clerk's offices, the fire and police departments, the Village board room, and a municipal gymnasium.

In the early 1940s, a large art deco style theater was built at the northwest corner of Thomas Street and Central Avenue, at 400 N. Central Avenue. To the south across Thomas Street lay Burbank School built in 1936, and cattecorner at the southeast corner lay Roxana Drug Store.

Seating approximately 580 people, the theater was originally designed for vaudeville acts as well as movie showings. In 1949, a tornado tore the roof off, but after repairs were made, the theater reopened. In the late 1960s, it was closed for nearly two years before being sold in June 1968 from the estate of Albert Critchlow to Bloomer Amusement Co. of Belleville. It was thereafter operated as BAC Cine for many years. In 1992, the Cine was purchased by Kerasotes Theatres, Inc., of Springfield, Illinois, which operated it until its closing in February 2002.

In 2000, the theatre was purchased from Kerasotes and was donated to the Roxana Church of the Nazarene, which is located just north of the theatre. The Church now operates the building as the Nazarene Community Center, where it is available for rental and group events.

how terrific, eh? i know boredom lead to this but looking back, i have no regrets:) ahahahaha:) special thanks to google search and wikipedia...it is never ok to use this source for research:)

ok, so first off, it has been quite some time since my last blog. i do not know exactly how long but certainly long. anywho, i hate zucchini...there is just something about it that does not satisfy. but i like this photo...a few months ago i went to riverside for a day of photo fun with a friend... :)
i have not been spending a whole lot of time taking photos lately and it saddens me because it is something i enjoy. i was looking through some old photos and this on captured my attention. this piece of paper was on a table where a clown had her paint set up because she was a face painter. she had a cotton candy pink wig on her head and the smile on her face even had me convinced...i almost jumped in line to ask for a butterfly or a unicorn or something. now i am not one for that type of what ever one might call it but she was so pleasant. the type of person one could just sit back and watch all day....in a not creepy way.
this week was interesting...i might write about it next week...when this week has passed.
this is a list of my most unfavorite things...just because:)
-bananas
-olives
-beer
-country music
-sound of music
-zucchini
-horror films
-football
-lifted trucks...and sometimes, the arrogant bros driving them.

over and out.

i finished the semester today!!!! ya! it was a terrific class followed by the most terrific day:)
this one is short because my eyes are stinging...because i am a bit tired:)
over and out.
ps...tomorrow i am delivering my application packet to ucla!

december is here!
christmas is in the air...really, i have been trying to avoid it at all costs due to the fact that i have a huge paper to submit...by the end of today. the closer christmas seems to be, the less time i seem to have before the semester is over.
i have been working on a paper for my darwin class...it is perhaps one of the greatest classes i have taken thus far. my paper is dealing with the influences of darwin on twentieth century germany, more specifically the holocaust. i have found that there is a belief that darwin himself was responsible for the horrendous events of the holocaust. that he is responsible for the murder of over six million jews. darwin is most known for his theory of evolution which is possible throught the process of natural selection. natural selection is the idea that the strong will survive while the weak perish. when darwin addressed this idea, he used many different examples, and yes, man kind was one of his examples. we need to remember that 19th century western civilization was all about conquering the unconquered. it was a time of discovery and one thing that many travelers came across where unrecognized tribes. these people were unable to communicate in a way europeans saw fit, so naturally, they were labeled "inferior". to many like darwin, according to the law of nature, it was just natural that the tribes would not win in the battle of savage vs. civilization.
by the time Hitler came to power, he had already been exposed to evolution and considered himself one of its most loyal supporters. hitler believed greatly in the extinction of the weaker races in order to preserve the ultimate superior race, and that race being the german people. he was able to take darwin's theory of evolution and fit it perfectly into what he was going to accomplish in germany. eugenics in germany was the result of the darwinian influence on hitler. a eugenics program was already under way even before the nazis took over. upon their arrival, a new set of laws to push jews out of everything and anything was set into motion. jews were released from their work places, forbidden to marry within the aryan race, stripped of the right to acquire knowledge through education, along with a number of other things. these laws are notoriously known as the nuremberg laws. this was the most successful way to weed jews out of anything german and yes indeed, they were successful. jews were compared to the lowest of life forms, the sewer rat, and in propaganda films, germans were told that extermination was absolutely necessary for superiority's sake.
genocide on yes, it is true that darwin dealt greatly with issues on superiority and inferiority but no one man is responsible for the acts of another, especially in this case. to try to put the blame of hitler on darwin's shoulders seems ludicrous. i know, call me crazy but that just seems crazy.
back to paper writing...