Wickid Clown Liquid

music/noises provided by Ripper (aka Brainsponge)

digital manipulation by TJ Larsen (aka BeastmasteR) except *

-2002

DOWNLOAD HERE

(*CD Tray Design/Ransom Letters by Ripper)

(*Porno Clippings/Ransom Letters by Ripper)

Juggalo Artwork 4

digital manipulation by TJ Larsen

Juggalo Artwork 3

digital manipulation by TJ Larsen

Juggalo Artwork 2

digital manipulation by TJ Larsen

Juggalo Artwork 1

digital manipulation by TJ Larsen

Impact in the Art Room

Written by TJ Larsen

December 16, 1998

            When I prepared for Triton Regional High School, my eighth-grade teachers recommended suitable classes for my freshman year.  Which included nearly all high honor classes.  However, the final decision was my parents’ and mine.  It was important to me to take an art class as well, so my father tried to fit the only freshman art class into my schedule.  My academic classes interfered with every attempt.  My parents and I asked for a compromise and eventually I got my art class scheduled into the curriculum.  The solution involved dropping Western Society, a ninth grade history class, and spending that period in the art department.  This special circumstance was allowed because Triton’s faculty already recognized my art abilities.

 

Triton High School’s art room was the largest classroom in the building.  It was also the messiest.  The walls were covered with students’ art in several mediums. The counters’ surfaces were cluttered with newspapers, magazines, and old art supplies.  The cupboards were jam-packed with what looked like even older art supplies.  One corner of the room had a sink full of photograph developing equipment.  All the long, wooden tables in the middle of the room were marked with years of paint, pen, and scratch marks.  There were large drawers and closets in the back of the room stuffed with students’ portfolios and three-dimensional projects.  The worst part was one large pyramid-like stack in the middle of the teacher’s desk.  The bookshelf that looked like a tornado had hit it.

 

The appearance of the Triton’s art room was shocking to me at first. I became used to it quickly.  After the ninth grade, I took art classes every year with the same teacher in the same room.  As a sophomore, I encountered a similar scheduling problem.  Once again, all my advanced classes conflicted with the sophomore art class.  This time I could not drop my history class.  The Academic Questions Magazine carried a report on high schools’ structure and requirements.  It indicated that “the percentage of the credits needed to graduate as a function of credits to be taken in history… fell from an average of 5.8 percent in 1964 to 3.4 percent in 1993” (Dissolution 1).  Triton required me to complete three courses in history to graduate high school.  So I signed up for Honors American History and the photography class, which was the only art class available to me.  Photography was scheduled for juniors and seniors, but I was allowed to attend because the art teacher recognized my talent and desire to be involved with art.

 

I became more aware of problems with Triton’s art department and curriculum scheduling when I joined the photography class and learned I was not the only person with class conflicts.  Often, my art teacher was actually teaching two different classes at the same time.  She would give instructions to photography students on one side of the room and lecture to students taking Graphic Design on the other side. The teacher seemed to always be preoccupied with a deadline or overwhelmed with another class.  The talented students, like myself, were given less attention than the struggling or reluctant students were.  Anybody could show up late for class or leave a little early, and most of the time, would be not even be noticed.  Chatting, homework, and last minute studying commonly took place in several art courses during my four years in high school.  I soon began to realize that my artistic interests were more by my own motivation than by the class projects assigned to me. I never realized how poor my high school art department was until I started taking Drawing and Composition at Endicott College.

 

My primary interest for college has always been art.  My first semester at Endicott did not work out well, but I did experience a more disciplined art environment in my Drawing and Composition class.  The course was held in a room specifically used for drawing and painting.  There were art stools scattered around and a fairly large pile of random objects with interesting curves, textures, and dimensions.  There was not that much more in the room besides that.  I showed up on time for class carrying my portfolio and leather bag filled with art supplies.  I did not have a choice.  The teacher was very strict about attendance, tardiness, and participation. 

 

My college art teacher provided a different classroom experience than my high school art teacher.  He focused on our projects.  There were no distractions in the room to take attention away from the subject.  He would have us draw the same image over and over again, each time in a different way or using mediums that I had never used before.  I was not used to being treated like every other student.  In high school I was known as a good drawer, but in college I was just another student who was learning as I went.  My classmates were all strangers to me and to each other at first.  There were many people at Endicott that obviously did not want to be there, but the majority of students in my Drawing and Composition class really wanted to learn.  “…Many kids who have hated school ever since they were kindergartners continue on to college because their parents push them to go” (Topolnicki 1). When I looked around the room, I never saw other classes’ homework being done.  I noticed that the slackers dropped out of class early in the semester.  As the semester continued, the work only got harder.  In the end I learned more about drawing in that one semester than I did in half my years in high school.

 

             I recognize that my high school art teacher was probably over-worked and given a very difficult schedule to fulfill.  Triton gave me the opportunity to create and present my art, but college has made me realize that art is a subject that you have to work on just as hard as any other academic class.  I have always had a desire to draw and the imagination to create images.  My art grades in high school never represented my true ability because I was never forced to expand my possibilities.  “Within both perception and reality, a teacher’s grading does matter because it influences the brief time teachers have with students, which can influence the students forever” (Maloof M13).  In high school my talent was appreciated and awarded, but in college my talent was challenged and expanded.  Now I know that I actually learn more when the courses I take are harder and force me to become determined to succeed.  If I can sneak in and out of the art room without being noticed how will I ever expect to make an impact?

Work Cited

Maloof, David. “’A’ is For ‘All Right,’ ‘B’ is For’(not) bad,”. The Boston Sunday Globe 6 Dec. 1998: M13.

National Association of Scholars. “The Dissolution Of General Education: 1914-1993.” Academic Questions Fall 1996: 1-2.

Topolnicki, Denise M. “Top 10: What Makes Them Great.” Money Sept. 1997: 1-3.

Torleif Skywalker

May the Force be with you.

Nothing Larger than an Anaconda

Written by TJ Larsen

November 19, 1998

Throughout the ages, human beings have been known to fear what they know little about. Snakes have been incorrectly considered slimy and generally feared because of their mysteriousness for years. Anacondas are the largest and one of the most feared snakes on the planet.  Most of the fear has been a result of mythology and South American lore.  A seventeenth century Jesuit priest, Padre Gumilia, documented that in the llanos of Venezuela anacondas invisibly spray poisonous vapors from their mouths as well as hypnotize their victims. A former curator of reptiles at the New York Zoological Society, Dr. James A. Oliver, referenced a Brazilian news paper that published a claim in 1948 that a 156-foot-long anaconda devoured several army soldiers and knocked over entire buildings.  Many unconfirmed anecdotes about anacondas’ history have made them famous for their size. “The llaneros firmly believe that an anaconda can bite a bull on the nose, knot itself around a tree and stretch to the thinness of a twig until the bull gives up, whereupon the snake squeezes the exhausted bull the death” (Kemper 4).  The fact is that their biology has been almost completely unknown unlike other leg-less reptiles of prey.  There has been minimal observation of anacondas in captivity and no research in the wild until 1992.

John Thorbjarnarson is a herpetologist who was researching crocodiles in Venezuela when he first started turning his attention to anacondas.  He consulted with the Venezuelan Wildlife Department (Profauna) after hearing rumors that anacondas could be found all over the low llanos of central Venezuela.  Before long, Thorbjarnarson began the first study of anacondas in their natural habitat with the Wildlife Conservation Society. His team got right to work on a ranch called El Cedral.  The area floods from May to September and dries up with only a few pools of water and muddy streams by November.  “Comprising over 130,000 acres, ten Manhattan Islands could fit within the boundaries of El Cedral ranch” (Thorbjarnarson 2).  They had their work cut out for them with all that land and no previous knowledge of how anacondas behave in their habitat.  Other local wildlife presented more of a threat to the research than the snakes themselves. Anacondas live in the same pools as piranhas, electric eels, and freshwater stingrays.  While walking through waist-deep water, one has to shuffle his or her feet to prevent contact with a stingray’s poison-tipped tail. Handling the anacondas takes a bit of courage and determination, but for Thorbjarnarson’s crew, it was finding them that proved to be the hardest part.

During the dry-season on El Cedral, the anacondas are easier to locate.  Their olive-yellow skin is glossy with black markings.  Their heads, stripped red, are small in comparison with their massive bodies.  “A 500-pound female anaconda holds the record for the world’s heaviest snake” (Watson 1).  Recognizing their extruding nostrils or the long lump in the mud and vegetation started out as the most effective method of catching the water snake.  This particular species of anaconda (Eunectes murinus) can also be found in the Amazon and the Orinoco river basins.  A second and smaller species (Eunectes notaeus) reside around the rivers of Argentina, Paraguay, and southern Brazil.  Despite what legends say, human beings are not one the anaconda’s preferred meals.  They eat animals as small as frogs and turtles along with larger prey like white-tailed deer.  Two Venezuelan students on Thorbjarnarson’s research team, Jesus Rivas and Maria Munoz have mastered the art of studying anacondas in the wild. They have learned first hand that it easy to prevent getting eaten by the snakes even if they get a bite of you.  Snakes’ teeth are retractable and pushing into the anaconda’s mouth loosens the grip and allows you to escape.  This is useful information, but more importantly, the only time an anaconda would ever become aggressive is if it is handled around the neck.

For over five years, Rivas and Munoz have successfully caught and studied over 450 anacondas while the water levels were low.  Once caught, a sock is taped around the snake’s head in order to blind and calm it down.  Then “the anacondas are marked by clipping a combination of their scales near the base of the tail, and also by noting the unique pattern of light and dark scales on the tail’s undersurface, which acts like a snake ‘fingerprint’; no two are alike” (Thorbjarnarson 4).  The tagged anacondas are always released back into their habitat.  Throughout the first year of research, Rivas and Munoz discovered and tracked their movement and behavior patterns by following anacondas implanted with transmitters. After that, the anacondas could be monitored when the season changed and El Cedral flooded.  Over all, the reproduction process is the most mysterious part of the anaconda.  For two to four weeks, up to a dozen males will coil around one larger female in what has been titled a “breeding ball” in the mud.  DNA tests on the offspring and the potential fathers will determine if only one or all of the surrounding males impregnates the female.  The anaconda does not lay eggs like most snakes, but she does lie in the sun to warm up to seventy embryos.  She also starves herself until she gives birth, so that an aggressive hunt will to hurt the unborn snakes.

Old tales about evil serpents and giant water snakes will always be told, but now the true nature of anacondas is developing as the research continues.  Our fear and superstition have given anacondas more of a reason to fear us.  Ranchers in Venezuela say that if you do not kill an anaconda on sight a curse will be put on you.  Skin trading is illegal and does not seem to threaten the population because for the most part anacondas disgust or frighten people away.  The knowledge that we have been lacking is part of the reason so many people fear the anaconda.  John Thorbjarnarson commented that “in the early part of this century, Theodore Roosevelt offered a sizable reward for anyone who could produce a live snake over thirty feet long, a reward that to this day has gone uncollected” (2).  The longest anaconda caught by his researchers was seventeen feet.  While the studies advance, maybe anacondas will earn more respect for being the world’s largest snake, instead of being feared for it.

Works Cited

Kemper, Steve and Gary Braasch. “If It Moves, Grab It, But Try Not To Get The End

That Bites.” Smithsonian Vol. 27. Issue 6. Sept. 1996: 1-7. (3-11-98)

Watson, Traci. “Snake! In Search Of The Wild Anaconda.” US News & World Report

Vol. 122. Issue 15. 21 April 1997: 1-2. (3-11-98)

Thorbjarnarson, John. “Trailing The Mythical Anaconda.” Americas Vol. 47. Issue 4.

Jul/Aug 1995: 1-6. (3-11-98)

Original Drawings

Illustrations by TJ Larsen

NASA: Patriotic Decline

Written by TJ Larsen

December 8, 1998

Thesis:

Today, budget cuts; a lack of public interest, and the dependency on International cooperation has put NASA at high risk of concluding our final chapter on space.  The latest attempts to revive the U.S. space program are dependent on questionable funding and optimistic results.  The future International space station may be the last in a long chain of disappointments for manned space research and NASA itself.

Outline:

I.               NASA’s Budget

a.            Mission to Planet Earth

b.            Space Station

c.            Shuttle technology (X33)

II.             International Efforts

a.            Russian’s Mir Example

b.              Russia’s Participation

III.           John Glenn and Most Recent Events

a.              Illegal Campaign Funding from China

b.              Reaction and Cover Up Attempt

A Soviet cosmonaut named Yuri Gagarin was the first man to physically leave our planet in a spaceship.  The United States sent Alan Shepard into space for 15 minutes just three weeks later.  On February 20, 1962, John Glenn rode in a Mercury capsule for five hours around the earth three times and ended up in the ocean.  A couple of days later, President John F. Kennedy made a public announcement that America would put a man on the moon before the decade’s end.  His promise was kept when Neil Armstrong planted the red, white, and blue flag on the lunar surface eight years later. America excelled in industrial projects faster than any other nation for a few more decades.  In the 1960s, there was a reason to be patriotic and admire all the accomplishments that NASA achieved.  Today, budget cuts; a lack of public interest, and the dependency on International cooperation has put NASA at high risk of concluding our final chapter on space.  The latest attempts to revive the U.S. space program are dependent on questionable funding and optimistic results.  The future International space station may be the last in a long chain of disappointments for manned space research and NASA itself.

Many projects that NASA has developed have been victims of large U.S. budget cutting.  The decision process takes a while before everyone with authority can agree what to support and what to eliminate.  Mission to Planet Earth is a program that almost never left the blueprint stage.  Allen Freedman wrote an article that identifies the Commerce Science and Transportation Committee Chairman, Larry Pressler, and other influential people who fought to preserve funding for the climate-study program, which was susceptible for budget cuts in 1995.  Pressler said, “Mission to Planet Earth may well be NASA’s most important program… (It) delivers direct benefits to the taxpayer, in contrast to the speculative spinoffs promised by some other space activities” (Freedman 2).  Vice President Al Gore, and George E. Brown Jr., a Democratic member of the House Science Committee, also supported the project.  Brown was quoted saying, “many Republicans are opposed to (Mission to Planet Earth) because it will study such issues as global warming and could produce evidence of the effects of greenhouse gases produced by industry” (Freedman 3).  Robert S. Walker, the Science Committee chairman, was against the idea.  He believed that other space programs deserved the funding that was considered for Mission to Planet Earth.  In 1991, Mission to Planet Earth was first intended to study earthquakes, the earth’s magnetic field, and other global issues but since it was restructured to just observing climate change with satellites, Walker thought the focus was too narrow.

Mission to Planet Earth did get fully funded with $1.36 billion.  On July 18, 1995 the House of Appropriations Committee also guaranteed the first initiatives for the future space station when they approved a bill that gave NASA $13.7 billion for 1996.  They also “restored funding for three space centers that a previous version of the bill had targeted for shutdown” (Freedman 1).  The International space station has always found support from the Clinton administration and Republican leaders.   Requests for funding NASA’s space program have been made and argued over for months at a time.  Some wanted to reduce the deficit by eliminating the space station, and others offered “to terminate the station and use the money for housing, environment and science programs” (Freedman 3).  The actual overall price of the space station is believed to be $21.3 billion, and when the launch cost is taken into consideration the price practically doubles to $40 billion.  NASA hopes that the American people will approve and be satisfied with their new international attempt to observe the longtime effects of space.  The station itself will most likely take a $100 billion to maintain and most of the cash will come form the United States while at least fifteen other nations share the results.

The money spent to construct the new station could be spent on developing an easier and less expensive way to send things into space. “The Atlas, Delta, and Titan boosters employed for satellite launches were all designed in the 1950s, before microelectronics, composite materials, or even pocket calculators” (Easterbrook 2).  Today’s space shuttles are structured basically the same way it was in 1972.  They cost so much that it would seem logical to relocate a large portion of the space station’s funds on the development to NASA’s X33 idea.  This is a plan to build a rocket that could orbit the earth in single-stage.  The X33 is supposed to “rise to space in one piece, just like the rockets in ‘Buck Rogers’ serials” and allow NASA to build the space station affordably later in the future (Easterbrook 2).  Putting a man on Mars seems like a possibility when you consider an advance in our launching technology of that caliber.  As smart as it sounds, the NASA administrator, Daniel Goldin, strongly emphasizes that cutting the funds of the space station would be “gambling with the future of the space program” (Freedman 2).  Since he has managed to keep the project going so far, we have no choice, but to wait and see if the results are favorable.  Many people fear that the huge International space station will be half-built and abandoned because of a lack of interest or other nations’ failure to collaborate efficiently.

When the Americans joined the Russians on Mir in 1993, the U.S. hoped to gain some insight on how to handle long-term missions in space.  Soviet Cosmonaut, Yuri Romanenko, has held the current record since he “returned successfully after 326 days in space,” (Smith 2).  The future International space station motivated the alliance.  Serious problems occurred on Mir on a regular basis while the U.S. astronauts were on board.  The head of the House Science Committee, James Sensenbrenner, “concluded that Mir was overdue for the scrap heap and pounded NASA officials for endangering the safety of U.S. astronauts” after learning the details of the mishaps (Guterl 2).  First, Mir was filled with smoke and fumes when some oxygen canisters burst into flames. Months later, the main oxygen generators broke down followed by the air-purification systems because of a coolant leakage into the atmosphere.  The biggest catastrophe put Mir at half power when commander, Vasily Tsibliyev, crashed the unmanned Progress cargo vessel into one of Mir’s six module hulls by joystick.  He was practicing an eyeballed docking maneuver instead of using the radar in case the unit ever failed.  Tsibliyev fired the braking thrusters a bit longer than usual because the Progress was heavier than normal and the pressure in the braking thrusters were lower than normal.  The result was a puncture to American Michael Foale’s lab and sleeping quarters and nonfunctional solar panels.  Marcia Smith, a space expert at the Library of Congress, assures us that the problems that happened on Mir can and are expected to happen on the new space station.  She even claims that the station’s complex hardware will most likely bring on even larger problems that the astronauts will have deal with in turn.

Russia’s participation in the International space station has been less than satisfactory in terms of budget and productivity.  Recently, they have failed to successfully build and launch their share of components for the space station.  The U.S. has been making huge efforts to keep the International space station international by funding both nations’ efforts.  “Bill Clinton approved an emergency subsidy of $660 million for Russia’s space agency to keep it from going out of business… strictly a transfer payment from U.S. taxpayers to Russian aerospace contractors” (Easterbrook 1).  NASA’s Administrator, Daniel Goldin, used to be the executive of the Strategic Defense Initiative and now he feels strongly about convincing the whole world that the U.S. and Russia can work together on projects that are beneficial to everybody.  Since NASA informed Congress in September 1998 that the U.S. might need to pay $1.2 billion over the next couple of years in order to keep Russia involved in the project, it seems like the project benefits Russia more than America. European and Japanese participation will effect the new space station, but most of the management, manufacturing, launches, and members of the crew will be American. NASA will have most of the control and the United States will provide almost all the funding.  The seven-year project began when the first launch containing the new station’s hardware was launched at Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakstam in November 1998.

January of 1998 was the Democratic Party’s set deadline for the United States Senate to finish its investigation in a presidential campaign scandal.  An article submitted to a magazine, Human Events, indicates that Clinton’s reelection campaign accepted money that was illegally funded from the Chinese government.  China’s assumed intentions were to loosen up the U.S. space technology trade restrictions so they could “be used to advance China’s efforts to build ballistic missiles that can accurately and reliably target U.S. cities for nuclear annihilation” (Globaloney 2).  Shortly after the Senate finished it’s failed investigation, NASA announced that on October 29, 1998 John Glenn, a ranking Democratic senator from Ohio, would orbit the earth once again on board the Discovery shuttle. A Public announcement was made stating that the purpose of Glenn’s participation was so that NASA could study the effects of space flight on the elderly. It became obvious to America that it was also an attempt to increase the public’s interest in the space program.  The fact that Glenn requested the opportunity and that a phone call from the White House to the NASA administrator, Daniel Goldin, made it possible for him to get his wish was not examined at first.  John Glenn is suspected of using his high position to have formed a cover up in the Senate’s investigation and in getting Beijing’s Communist regime off the hook as well as Clinton’s campaign.

In return for Glenn’s years of support and helping the administration cover up the Communist regime’s attempt to illegally influence the U.S. election, he requested a ride in the Discovery flight from President Clinton himself.  Because Daniel Goldin works for Clinton, the administration’s claim that it was purely Goldin’s decision to send Glenn up in the shuttle was not going to be enough to settle the matter.   In April, Bill Clinton admitted that Glenn had asked the for the opportunity in a speech at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas with John Glenn and Daniel Goldin sitting right behind him.  Mike Mullane, a retired U.S. Air Force Col., spoke up about his feelings on the John Glenn situation in the September before the liftoff.  He explained that to try “to escape from a shuttle in a time-critical situation with 831lbs. of equipment strapped to your body requires muscle and lightning-fast reaction” (Globaloney 3).  Being a former shuttle astronaut himself with 356 orbit hours under his belt, Mullane knows what he was talking about.  He warned that Glenn’s participation in the up-coming Discovery mission would surely be a jeopardizing factor.  Severe emergencies on launch pads and in-flight bailouts or crash landings are a reality in these kinds of missions and John Glenn could not be able to accurately perform under extreme conditions as well as some other more qualified men.  63-year-old Story Musgrave and 68-year-old John Young are more experienced, and NASA has medical records on them that are more appropriate for the research. If NASA really wanted to study the medical effects of space flight on the elderly, they would not have picked Glenn, who has spent only five hours in space 36 years ago.

History shows that success and patriotism can be achieved with money.  It seems that it takes more money than ever to make everybody happy these days.  Some critics say, “Apollo succeeded by drowning its problems in money” (Roland 3).  If that is true, NASA is finding it harder to gain comfort from America’s budgeting system.  The U.S. space program is making drastic efforts to gain the public’s acceptance and continue allied forces in the manned space program.  The International space station will either be a sight for sore eyes or a thorn in NASA’s side.  Only time will tell.

Works Cited

Easterbrook, Gregg. “Cosmic Clunker.” New Republic Vol. 219. Issue 22. 30 Nov. 1998:  1-3.

Freedman, Allan. “Space Station, Earth Mission Still Big Targets For Budget –Cutters.” Congressional Quarterly Weekly Report Vol. 53. Issue 29. 22 Jul. 1995:  1-5.

“Globaloney In Orbit.” Human Events Vol. 54. Issue 42. 6 Nov. 1998:  1-5.

Guterl, Fred. “One Thing After Another.” Discovery Vol. 8. Issue 1. Jan. 1998:  1-3.

Roland, Alex. “Inside NASA: High Technology and Organizational Change in the U.S.

Space Program.”  Issues in Science and Technology Vol. 9. Issue 4. 1993: 1-3.

Smith, Jeanette. “As Space Program Approaches 21^st Century, Medicine

Plays Key Role.” JAMA, The Journal of the American Medical Association Vol. 263. Issue 2. 12 Jan. 1990: 1-3.

Rage In Norway '96

Photo credit to TJ Larsen



I took these pics from the front row of a Rage Against the Machine concert at a festival on the Isle of Cafe in Oslo, Norway. Neil Young, Bad Religion, and Gov't Mule also performed, but Rage stole the show! The entire island (larger than a football stadium) turned into one gigantic mosh pit.



When the music started, I was instantly in the middle of a situation I wasn't ready for. I snapped as many pictures as I could with the disposable camera (most of them are blurry) and then fought my way through an endless crowd of vikings to safety.



That was the most intense situation I had been in to date. It was AWESOME. I was fortunate to see RATM one more time before they broke up, at the Great Woods Amphitheater in Mansfield, MA along with the Wung Tang Clan (minus ODB). Thats was in '98.



In 2000, I actually had tickets for a Rage/Beastie Boys event in hand, but one of the Beasties injured himself skateboarding and they postponed the show. Before it could be rescheduled, Rage had disbanded. I wasn't happy about that...



But... Seeing RATM in Norway was the ultimate! I've been telling that story for over 13 years. Good grief.

Y2K in Perspective

Written by TJ Larsen

October 29, 1998

The world that we live in provides many luxuries and advantages, as more people become computer literate.  Technological advances allow us to create elaborate graphs and diagrams.  Motion pictures become visually awesome with computer programmers’ increase of knowledge.  Industrial machines, company records, and even employees’ paychecks are dealt with by using computers.  We live in a world that has become more dependent on computers than any other time in history.  Our technology is held together by individual programs and network systems.  As the year 2,000 approaches, a possible crisis has become apparent. It is called the Y2K crisis or the millenium bug.  When the clock strikes midnight on January first, 2,000, most internal dates in computers are going to turn from 99 to 00.  The problem with this last two-digit change is that computers are going to assume that the date is 1900 instead of 2,000. You may not believe that such a small technicality could cause a large-scale problem, but it is large enough to scare businesses across the country into putting millions of dollars into finding a cure. What is the impact on a technologically advanced society without functional technology?  The hype could be over exaggerated.  But those who do not prepare themselves could be in for a shock. Our human spirit will need to be strong in order to get through the worst-case scenarios.

There are those who have an optimistic view of the millennium ahead and there are those who see our future as an economic downfall. One concern is that employers will not be able to pay their workers because of a loss of access to the account information.  When workers can not get paid there are a number of possible results.  Family income will be on the line.  Will people resort to rioting if the economy falls? Hopefully there will not be an excessive amount of withdrawals from banks around the world so that there is no money left to maintain our society.  Religious fanatics have a new reason to ensure the prophecy of the coming apocalypse. Individuals like these recommend that we all run for the hills.  The problem raises many questions in our technologically dependent society.  Joseph Nocera writes on the Y2K bug’s consequences.  He believes that the aftermath will be more annoying than devastating.  “It... presumes that the breakdown of computers ranks with the real social crises—like Asia’s economic collapse or AIDS—when it’s not even close” (Nocera 3).  There most likely will not be a large amount of deaths or community mayhem related to the Y2K bug, but there are some serious possible breakdowns.  The IRS might not be able to process or accept tax information.  Airline passengers’ safety may conflict with their traveling schedules when the traffic-control systems stall.  Food shortages and transport failures could cause a panic in our fast-paced society.  Commuters and patrons all over could be denied the resources they need.

            Hospitals have the responsibility to ensure a safety for patients moving into the new millennium.  Thousands of pieces of equipment are being tested for serious, life threatening results of the Y2K bug.  Some computers will turn to the date that the system was installed instead of 00 and will also effect all systems interacting with it.  Anita Elash brings to our attention that non-compliant electrocardiograph machines could fail to produce dated output strips correctly.  This is something that nurses and doctors can do by hand, but some patients require several of them and may be neglected because of other severe problems.  Alarms on monitors could fail to sound and medical problems might go undetected for some individuals.  One reason for computer failure in this area is that diagnostic trends could start being misinterpreted by the date functions.  “Even if they don’t have a date function, many pieces of medical equipment contain an embedded microchip that could be programmed to keep track of the date and time or verify maintenance dates” (Elash 2).  With a possibility of a large amount of new patients needing attention in hospitals, there is no telling how doctors and nurses will be effected by the computer failures. Both administrators and direct care personnel will feel pressure, and patient care will need to deal with the steady flow of malfunctions while handling their regular workload.

            Computer programmers are paid to work out the problems that are predicted to happen in the year 2,000.  If there is a cure for the millennium bug, there is sure to be a price for it. One large network of Boston hospitals called Caregroup has contained their Y2K cost next year to $58 million.  Engineers and Information System technicians work daily to assess items such as patient beds, monitors, and operating room equipment which are vulnerable to shutdown.  There can not be just an individual solution for an individual’s interests.  The way our technology is inter-connected, the effects of the future failures must be stopped from all locations of malfunction.  Planning and predicting are two methods used to try to help solve this universal problem.  Even though we have never had this situation burden us before, many institutions believe that there is a way to avoid a large-scale crisis.  John L. Petersen wrote an article on social transformation resulting from the Y2K bug.  He said that “corporate and community experience with scenario planning has taught an important principle: We don’t need to be able to predict the future in order to be well prepared for it” (Petersen 7).  If everybody does his or her part to prevent a chaotic scenario from becoming reality we should be able to overcome the millennium bug without too much loss.  If this can be done, we will have a head start on the next big technological set back that comes along. The courage of the human spirit has always become obvious after natural disasters occurred in the past.  Collaborative relationships need to be made and held together in order to overcome the Y2K crisis.  Truly we all have to rely on our human spirit to overcome whatever awaits us in the year 2,000 in case we can not download a solution. 

Works Cited

Elash, Anita. “Time’s Running Out as Physicians Await Y2K Fallout.”

CMAJ: Canadian Medical Association Journal Vol. 159. Issue 6. 22 Sept. 1998: 1-5. (10-20-98)

Nocera, Joseph and Elyssa Lee. “Worried About the Year 2000 Problem?

Get Real.” Money Vol. 27. Issue 9. Sept. 1998: 1-4. (10-20-98)

Petersen, John L., and Margaret Wheatley. “The  Y2K problem: Social

Chaos or Social Transformation?” Futurist Vol. 32 Issue 7. Oct. 1998: 1-10. (10-20-98)

A Brief History in Art

Contact me at bstmstr44@gmail.com

2009

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I have been doing freelance graphic design for most of my life. When I was in the 5th grade, the Pine Grove Elementary School administration asked me to illustrate the cover of their annual student handbook. Ever since then, I've been tapped to design or illustrate tons of original art for various schools I've attended.

Over the years, I've also submitted a lot of artwork to galleries, contests, and musicians. I earned my BFA degree from Endicott College in 2002. During the last 3 of my college years I completed 3 internships but was not fortunate enough to land a full-time job at any of them. So I did what I believed most people with a visual communications degree in a Post 9-11 world had to do, I became a door-to-door solicitor.

It took 3 years for me to burn out on outside sales. Snce then I've worn the hat of a CVS assistant manager and a database software developer and an underground rapper. I slowly started shifting my focus to making music in the 00's , but I never stopped designing. In fact, despite a few major hard drive crashes and faulty Zip Discs, I've managed to save the bulk of my work.

In the weeks to come, I will be sharing select portfolio pieces from my personal stash. Constructive criticism is always welcome. Criticism with cruel intentions is more likely on the internet, but it is what it is. Go ahead and tell me how you really feel, most of the time its better than getting no feedback at all. It is, after all, your world; I just live, scribble and make noise in it. ;)

-TJ

Motivation For Education

Written by TJ Larsen

October 8, 1998

          After graduating from Triton Regional High School I went on to Endicott College in Beverly only to have the worst academic experience of my life. In high school I was in virtually all high honor classes and was a fairly good student, but I let my grades fall after I was accepted to Endicott. After a summer of celebration and relief from high school pressures I entered Endicott in the fall of 1997 as a graphic design major and lived on campus in a co-ed dorm building. However, I got off to a bad start.  I am now in Northern Essex Community College a year later in order to prove myself academically so that I can return to Endicott.

            I wanted to be an artist my whole life.  In my early elementary school years, my teachers recognized that I was artistically inclined.  I actually enjoyed the projects assigned in art class and always put in the extra effort that seemed to come naturally to me.  I designed the covers for my elementary school’s handbook, my junior high school’s yearbook, several senior high sports’ programs, and even faculty Christmas cards.  In high school when my art was published three times in one issue of the Boston Globe Magazine about suburban and rural youth called “In Our Own Words 2”, I was confident enough that I could further my education as a graphic design major.  I showed interest in Endicott College, and my guidance counselor assured me that I would be accepted if I applied there.  The staff at the Yale Daily News warn us that even though some guidance counselors may be quick to recommend or approve some schools it is wise to do plenty of research so you can make your own decision.  I chose Endicott College after several visits to the campus.

I found the hardest application requirement to be two written essays.  I knew these essays would be a major part of the admission process, and I was afraid to be rejected because of poor writing. Theodore O’Neil, an admission director, wrote about the importance of the college essay.  He notes that not requiring this admission technique would relieve students of a great deal of struggle.  Then he states that colleges need to be able “to judge the whole person, and in order to do that, [they need] to hear a voice that resonates with the human qualities of the academically qualified applicant” (223).  I spent many days and nights preparing my essays for Endicott.  When I was finished with them I felt I had presented myself especially well with the help of my S.A.T. scores and grade point average.

Living on campus played a large role in my failure at Endicott College.  There were more unnecessary fire alarm pulls, broken windows, destroyed and stolen furniture, and drug and alcohol induced disturbances to qualify my dorm to be the worst co-ed dorm Endicott has ever had in its five years of being a co-ed school.  I had a horrible work environment in my dorm and I did not take advantage of other study locations to prepare for my class assignments.  The third floor, which I happened to lived on, was a jungle.  The stairwell entrances all had signs that said, “Welcome to the jungle,” in computer print, and someone always kept the Guns ‘N Roses theme song blasting from his room during normal class hours.  I was distracted enough so that I failed to complete four of the five courses I was enrolled in.  I did not take the work load seriously enough to keep up with assignments, requirements and deadlines.  In addition to not meeting academic standards, I, myself, acquired enough residential violations to qualify me to be kicked out of my dorm building.  I was found in possession of alcohol by my resident director on more than one occasion, had a tendency to violate quiet hour regulations, and withheld information regarding marijuana offenses in order to protect a few of my peers.  I was also caught hosting a non-student who was restricted from campus grounds in my dorm room before most of the other violations even occurred.  I was clearly on the institutions and faculty’s bad side from the beginning.  In light of the situation, I made the decision to take the second semester off from college to work full time and clear my head.  I planned to return to Endicott in the Fall semester of 1998 to begin again.  The school accepted my leave of absence and I moved back into my home in Rowley. 

My time off from Endicott was well spent, and in my opinion, much needed.  I landed a

full time job in the Newburyport Industrial Park and adjusted to a schedule of working five days a

week without any homework assignments over the weekends.  My advisors told me that if I had not requested a leave of absence as an “at risk student”, I would have been expelled from the college.  Taking into consideration that I expressed interest in returning to Endicott with intentions of improving my academic performance, they decided to allow me to do so under the conditions that an “at risk student” must agree to.  Endicott requires proof that I am serious about improving my grades and therefore required me to complete two academic courses with a 3.0 grade average or better during summer school.  The problem with this was that I had no time to enroll and attend a summer school class at such short notice while I was working full time.  I also had no interest in taking classes over the summer.  I had a serious decision to make, and I did not want to end my education with only a high school diploma.  There has been a rising number of 25- to 29-year-olds completing college throughout the years.   Graduation from a four-year college has “become increasingly associated with economic status and success…” (Boston Globe, A9).  I knew working in the Industrial Park for the rest of my life would be like throwing away a perfectly good opportunity to educate myself for a higher paying job in the future.  The compromise agreed upon is that I could sign up for two credit courses anywhere I chose in the fall and return to Endicott in the spring if my academic performance is adequate.

I now had to look at community colleges to fulfill my requirements at Endicott.  I placed requests over the phone for catalogs of credit courses  from Northern Essex and North Shore Community Colleges.  When they arrived in the mail, I chose NECC because I found the catalog straight forward and the layout easier to understand compared to North Shore’s.  I was able to locate the classes I needed quickly and found the course descriptions that corresponded without any confusion.  It is important to know what exactly you what to get out of a college curriculum.  After establishing “your personal criteria, your investigation should be active and should include a campus visit where possible” (Shain, 214).  Northern Essex, being located in Haverhill, made little influence on my decision to choose the college.  This time I did not need to write any essays to be accepted.  I visited NECC for the first time, one day before my classes started, in order to purchase books.  Honestly I can say I am not interested in how the college perceives itself or the stereotypes I have heard about it.  I just want to put all of my efforts into the classes I have signed up for.  My experience at Endicott, which has led me to NECC, has given me a new desire to be successful in education and it is up to me to turn my learning habits around in order to achieve my goal.