Free mobile phones!

No, this blog has not been taken hostage by some spambot and this post is not an annoying pop-up, advertising and allegedly claiming to give away mobile phones for free. If you genuinely believed that - although it blows my mind if you did, as you have to be quite the internet equivalent of a stone age Neanderthal to still fall for these things - I strongly urge you to go away now. Yes, press the little red cross in the corner of your screen now, you can do it! Shoof, shoof!

Still with us? Gooood. As you’re reading this, FREE MOBILE PHONES has apparently caught your attention. It does seem like an odd title, doesn’t it? ‘Free mobile phones’ is, in this society, a combination of the two most important things in this world. No wonder I almost have to put a warning spoiler at the top, preventing this blog to be overcrowded with cheap-ass materialists. I’m glad you made it through to the part I really wanted to talk about, though.

First, the word “free”. Of course, all people want things for free, without paying for it, and I’m not saying that’s bad, but we’re living in a capitalistic world which is all about making profit. Not only businesses, but everyone. What better way to make profit than getting things without paying for them? That’s ideal!

We all want so much, and at the same time pay as little as possible for it. We all want to be rich so we can have everything, like an iPad or a big television but we’ve already got so much! I myself am a perfect example of this as well. Still not convinced? Still thinking you don’t have much? Let’s just count the things on my desk right this moment:  

- iPod Touch
- Mobile Phone
- Stereo
- Cable from iPod to stereo
- Remote control from my stereo
- 2 Lee Child books
- Calculator
- 4 stones (from Italy, Greece, Spain and France)
- 5 school books (oh, joy! *sarcastic*)
- Mobile phone charger
- Wallet
- Cup of tea
- Clothespin
- Letter from the bank
- 3 broken pens
- 2 broken pencils
- Pot of ink
- Map of Holland
- ID card
- Libararycard
- Bank card
- Over 50 sheets of paper
- 4 Christmas cards (with a cute little snowman on it! Woo!)
- A bone of a sheep (don't ask)
- A lamp
- A Ludlum thriller (the Bacroft Strategy)
- Diary
- A CD
- 2 writing feathers
- 1 empty carton box
- An eraser
and finally 6 pieces of leftover firework.

Added up and not even counting the 50 pieces of paper, those are 57 separate individual objects I have, just on lying around on my desk! I’m willing to bet I’m not the only one with a messy and full desk like this, let alone room, let alone the entire house. Still convinced you haven’t got much?

That’s one of the things I like about the Gospel According To Larry by Janet Tashjian, which tells us the story of teenage Josh with very strong opinions, who ‘preaches’ them on the internet. One of the things he thinks would make the world better, is having only 75 possessions. If he ever has more than exactly 75 possessions, he has to throw or give something away. That includes the 50 pieces of paper I have lying around here, so if I were to follow his rule, I’d be on the street by now handing out useless empty boxes, bones, pens and what not to people out to people like crazy!

No, I’m not saying we should all follow Josh’s example and strictly limit yourself to having 75 things. However, having pieces of paper and a pen to use would make quite a lot of people in the world jealous. We shouldn’t just give everything away and we shouldn’t give up saving for the things we like, but be happy about it and should realise what we have before we throw it away or carelessly leave it lying around somewhere.

That’s it for this blog, no time to talk about the mobile phones left, but the second part will be up soon!

Signed,

Torino&Griffith.

DayZeroProject

Hello everyone and – although you’re all probably quite tired of hearing it - a late happy new year from the both of us!

I bet all of you have fancy stories to tell, as NYE is always quite exciting. I for example, unlike Griffith, celebrated New Year in France this year! Sounds rather awesome, doesn’t it? Well, it was.. unless you take in account the fact while Griffith was comfortably at home, sleeping late and recovering from the night before, I jumped into the sea the day after! Bloody hell, that was incredibly cold! Brr.. I’ll never be doing that again!

But fortunately, by doing that, I can now proudly say I’ve accomplished yet another of my 101 goals for the DayZeroProject. Woohoo, me!

If you haven’t heard of the DayZeroProject, it’s a project quite popular under bloggers, but other people as well, in which you have to make a list of 101 goals you want to accomplish in 1001 days (for the non-mathematicians among us, or those that prefer me to do all the counting for you, that’s about 2.75 years). Quite a long term project, yes, but it’s very motivating to do those little things which make you enjoy life, but you’ve never quite realised were important. In the beginning, when compiling the list, you’re probably going to come up with lots of heavy and difficult stuff such as ‘graduate’, ‘write a book’ or ‘move to Japan’, but you can’t possibly keep coming up with 101 of those examples. Silly little things such as climb a tree, only use your bicycle to travel for a week or walking along the beach during sunset are equally important.  Another popular goal is becoming a vegetarian for a month, or keeping your room clean for three months. Yes, it requires some persistence from you, but it also leaves you with a good feeling about yourself and it may actually become a habit! Being a vegetarian that is of course, not keeping your room clean. ;D

Yes, some of these are really hard to do, but it’s not a shame if you fail. If you’ve completed only 80% of your goals, that’s still good! Of course some goals, the little things, are really easy to do. Shooting with a bow and arrow, for example. It’s not something you would easily decide to do on a free afternoon, but if it’s on the list, you’re encouraged to. Because there’s a reason why you’re doing it, and you actually feel good after spending an afternoon at doing something you like.

The point is, this project stimulates you to think of things you’ve always wanted to do – may they be life-changing or just little – and, because of the limited time limit, stimulates you to do them as well! Two and a three quarters of a year is quite a long time, long enough not to completely have to change your lifestyle and dedicate it to accomplishing a goal like as ‘write a book’, but short enough to be encouraging to actually start it. You can’t put it off for too long, you’ll have to finish it within 1001 days!

Like me, Griffith has a list of goals as well, but it’s quite different from mine. One of my goals was actually to convince three other people to participate in the DayZeroProject, and she was one of my victims ;)

If you’ve been convinced to participate and make some goals of your own, which we really urge you to do because it’s quite awesome, you  can check out this site. Unfortunately, the site isn’t in the air at the moment, but be sure we’ll leave you a notice when it is. In the meantime, don’t be afraid to comment us what goals you’d want to achieve if you had 1001 days time.


However, it's incredibly hard to come up with interesting, realistic but challenging goals the rest of the world hasn't thought of yet. That's why we want you to comment the goal you look forward to completing most, or - if you've already completed your goals - the goal that you enjoyed doing most. I'm really interesting to find out how creative you all can be!

Signed,

Torino&Griffith.