Had a dream last night that somehow wrapped itself up. Isn’t it always fun when your dreams do that? It’s almost like they’re planned out.
I dreamt I was hired by some kind of graphic design company. They had a fancy new office and everything. So I get hired, and literally the second I sit down to work I get a call from a bank or something that wants to hire me too (for more money, etc., or something). So I close the one file I opened, some bad looking graphic that needed work, and leave to do this other thing.
Bunch of other stuff happens, but just before I wake up, I’m driving down the road and I see a billboard with that graphic I didn’t have time to work on. And it’s a super ugly billboard. And this woke me up because I thought, ‘I could have made that billboard good, but I quit on them.’
I’m not sure what it all means…
Anyway, talking about Arrietty yesterday, and how I didn’t really read books when I was a kid, brings up something I’d like to discuss.
I follow LeVar Burton on twitter, I’m not 100% sure why. Maybe it’s an effort to follow as many cast members of Star Trek: The Next Generation as I can. But there’s only like 2 left, I even unfollowed Wil Wheaton, ‘cuz that guy got on my nerves. So it’s really down to LeVar and Brent Spinner, or Geordi and Data. However, Geordi is not who I associate LeVar Burton with primarily. For some people, Geordi is first and foremost Kunta Kinte.
But not me. I haven’t even seen Roots. I know him primarily from Reading Rainbow.
httpv://youtu.be/c6j8EiWIVZs
As a kid, even though we had illegal cable, I still found myself watching a lot of stuff on PBS. I watched Jack Horkheimer – Stargazer, I watched Bill Nye, I watched Carmen Sandiego, and I watched Mr. Rogers. Interestingly, I didn’t watch Sesame Street, it was just never my show. But I did watch Reading Rainbow.
The Reading Rainbow wiki page says that the show ‘encouraged reading among children.’ It did not have that effect on me. I liked the show for the portions where LeVar would go places and show things. I used to hate it when he would say “but you don’t have to take my word for it” because that means 5 minutes of stupid kids talking about stupid books. They’re always crappy kids books, which might be a redundant phrase. Of course, even if it was interesting, after listening to these kids talk about the books they read, I had no reason to actually read those books myself. So while the show was designed to promote reading and literacy, it had the opposite effect for me.
When I think back on it, though, I can’t remember reading one good book in my whole childhood. Not until like 10th grade did they assign a book that was actually entertaining, and even then half the books were still total shit.
Reading Rainbow likes to make it sound like reading helps the imagination, but for me it always seems to hinder the imagination. I mean, they’re telling you what to imagine, writing it out in detail. A real good imagination flourishes with no guidance. TV isn’t any better, but at least TV has pictures and music and a set length of time.
So now, Reading Rainbow is coming back. This time as an app. I’m glad Reading Rainbow is back in some form, even if reading totally sucks ass.
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