Rosemarie Dominguez
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Posts by Rosemarie Dominguez
Counting Calories (and Turning 19!)
0Forget eating almost 3,000 calories… just eating over 1,200 feels like a smack in the face – a failure at its best. For a few moments it feels like all effort gone to waste. Will I ever recover? Will I gain even one pound back? Will I have to go through the torture of losing it all over again?
Today I had a belated birthday with all of my friends at Houlihan’s. It was very fun and I couldn’t have asked for anything better – or any better friends. In fact they’re so great that they got me a ice-cream cake slice. It was amazing… filled with snickers and oreos and wondrous, delicious things – but it also all ended up in my stomach.
And now not only do I feel like I got smacked in the face, but also like I just got punched in the gut. Anyone who is trying to lose weight knows how hard it is to mess up. Yes it’s true, tomorrow’s a new day. But when I weigh myself tomorrow, if I am not at least the same weight I was this morning I am going to feel like its not a new day, but a repeat of today. I will go through the same problem – only maybe I’ll defeat it this time.
College is going to be hard. With my friends constantly eating raw cookie dough and making chocolate chip oreo cookies, how will I handle myself? Maybe by remember how I feel right now. But to be honest, I also have to remember that one day will not mess me up. It takes 3,500 excess calories to gain a pound, and I did not eat anywhere near that. I can defeat this struggle. I can reach my goal. One day will not bring me down.
Budgeting and Job Hunting
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Not having a job or parents who simply load money into your bank account every month is a pretty big deal. So, with a little over a hundred dollars and about a month of college left, I had a pretty big problem. My solution? A budget. I have a little white board hanging on the wall of my dorm. On it, I planned out my epic budget. Food. Metro cards. Entertainment. These three things were the epitome of my plan. I gave 10 dollars to each except for entertainment, to which I gave 15 dollars. I know what you’re thinking. I am going to be skin and bones sitting in a Broadway show—that’s what my friends said, and they made fun of me for days. Truth is, that’s what a movie costs these days and I figured if we didn’t see a movie one day I’d reallocate the money to food. It was hard saying no to so many things, but I had to do it.
I love spending time with my friends, and I’m the type that will spend money on experiences rather than things. It’s what I do with my life that matters to me, not what I have. But, as a result of the unaccounted for laundry expenses and such I slowly amounted a mini-debt. If one week I obtained a babysitting job, I was able to pay it off, but it would inevitably come back. I came to one conclusion: I need to plant a money tree! Just kidding: I need a job. Last summer I worked at a summer camp at the Community Church of Great Neck. I was blessed by it, but it wasn’t really what I wanted, and I thought I could benefit from a more permanent job. There started my job search.
I applied to about 20 retail stores at Roosevelt Field Mall. I was up til 3am filling out all the applications once I got them and returned to the mall the next morning to hand them back. Then it was time to wait….
…and wait…
I was getting impatient so I decided to walk Hillside Ave to see who was hiring.
When CVS told me I had to apply online and they only check every two weeks I grew impatient and gave up…
…and instead I got a delicious Ralph’s Italian ice! Yummy! I was satisfied… but jobless.
* * *
Today, June 12, 2012, I was offered a job at Express! YES! I am excited and nervous. I hope it goes well!
Avengers, Tributes, and Lovers
1It seemed like first semester was full of great excitement. Museums! Broadway shows! Unique New York City experiences. But second semester had greater things in store. My friends and I had the chance to meet a young married couple who endured a horrible car accident. The wife lost five years of memory, but months later she fell in love with her one true love once again. We hung with the Lorax. He showed us how important it is to care for our environment. This girl, Katniss, and a guy named Peeta befriended us midway through the semester. We watched as they played these strange games where they had to fight for their lives. And, my favorite, we met Ironman, Captain America, Thor, and all of their friends.
What? You want to call my bluff? I have proof on tape: The Vow. The Lorax. The Hunger Games. The Avengers.
Fine. We didn’t exactly do all of those things, but it sure felt like it. I guess you can say rather than experience the beautiful New York City, we did quite the opposite. Maybe we did get a little boring. Lazy? Don’t push it. We went to the midnight premiere of The Hunger Games. Plus, movies are an art too. Of the four, my favorite was by far The Avengers. It was a perfect combination of action, suspense and comedy. All of the Avengers worked perfectly together after a few smacks in the face, and yes, they saved the world.
My favorite part of the movie was either when the hulk threw an unexpected punch sending Thor across the room or when Ironman asks Jarvis if he’s ever heard of the tale of Jonah. Watch the movie to see what I’m talking about!!
The Vow was definitely my second favorite—it reminded us of a valuable thing that many today take for granted: the vow. When we get married we think it doesn’t really mean much. Some people don’t get married because what’s a piece of paper, right? Wrong. When two people get married they vow never to stay together in sickness and in health, for better or for worse. That’s what love is.
Movies can teach us a lot or even just remind us of what we have forgotten.
Too bad we have to pay $13 every time we forget.
A Visit To My Childhood
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When I heard that TobyMac was going to be at Acquire the Fire, a national youth conference, I knew I had to be there too. I grew up with his music and could not miss the opportunity to see him live in concert. I was listening from the days of DC Talk, his group before he went solo, and I still love his old songs. They’re the best, in fact. From Jesus Freak and Consume Me to In The Light and My Will, they’re all classics. Made to Love, Ordinary World, J Train, Irene, Gone, and many, many more are some of my favorites of his old songs when he went solo.
Above is a picture of TobyMac (center) and two of the members of his “Diverse City” crew showing off their epic talent! Everyone at the concert was dying to see him! As a leader of my church youth group, I had the upper hand of knowing what time the concert would be. Around 8pm, every time there was a break in the conference, hundreds of people would run down to the stage only to be sent up moments later. Around the third time running down, we finally got to see him, and I was right up front!! I couldn’t have been more excited! I knew every word of every song and danced the whole time! And I bought a huge TobyMac poster for my dorm and a rubber bracelet to show for the amazing night.
Definitely a check off for my life bucket list!
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
0Today my friends and I finally got to see Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, a movie adaption of Jonathan Safran Foer’s book. The movie was slow paced, but emotional. Overall, I did not love it. It lacked the beautiful story that the grandparents of Oscar, the main character, had. They had a beautiful love story and lived through the Dresden bombings. They were particularly significant, because the other half of the novel was about Oscar and a search that he embarks on after his father dies in the attacks on 9/11. There was a deep and satisfying connection between the two stories in the novel. The movie, on the other hand, was more focused on Oscar and his quest. It focused on the pain that Oscar went through because of the twin tower attacks on 9/11. It also focused a lot more on Oscar 
as a character in himself. He was portrayed as autistic, much more than in the book; the bruises he gave himself were also much more brutal than I imagined.
While it did not live up to the book, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, if anything, did a good job at bringing together the extraordinary pain of this historical event. Ten years later, it is a good way to recognize the lives lost.
The 2012 Bucket List
0My friends and I sat in the 24 hours McDonalds in Times Square, and with loads of excitement created this bucket list on a paper bag. The deal was that to complete the list only one of us (at least) had to do each.
1. get abs
2. take a dance class (ballroom)
3. have a first kiss
4. exercise our voices
5. dance in fountain
6. road trip
7. see a drive in movie
8. sleepover in apartment for two nights
9. Lock-In (one whole day)
10. man hunt on campus
11. concert
12. search for an apartment
13. get a turtle
14. ice-skating in Rockefeller Center
15. audition for a play
16. skiing/snowboarding
17. conquer a fear
18. volunteer together (all of us)
19. plant a tree on campus that bears fruit
20. bury and dig up box with stuff in it
21. write letters to each other and ourselves and mail them back to each other August 2015
22. make more guy friends
23. do something illegal
24. go on a date in 2012
25. be in a parade in NYC
26. go to disney
27. go commando on the same day
28. change hairstyle
29. do choreographed dance in subway
30. do choreographed dance at club
31. buy something new and funky
32. dress each other
33. do something out of comfort zone
34. make a music video
2012: A New Year
0A new year has begun, but the old year is still weighing heavy on me. 2011 has really been the best year I can remember: a fun-filled end of senior year and end of high school, prom, a busy summer working, volunteering in Jamaica, and a wonderful beginning of college at Macaulay Queens. An end and beginning that I will never forget. This blog (e-portfolio) holds a significant amount of what I have had the opportunity to experience towards the end of 2011- my first semester as a college student. I know 2012 has a lot more coming. I am starting to take some classes that I need for my major and I have decided to minor in Business and Liberal Arts. I am still undecided about whether or not Spanish will be my major or minor. I don’t know where in Spain I want to study abroad, what programs are being offered, etc. It’s crazy to think that I don’t know where in the world I’ll be living in a couple of years.
If 2011 has taught me anything, though, it’s to take one day at a time. Let God take me where He may. Each day has enough trouble of its own. My wish is to take each day as it comes and experience each one individually. And next new years I am SO going into Times Square!
Lysistrata Jones: My Second Broadway Musical
0On December 12th, I had the opportunity to watch my second Broadway musical for only five dollars and it was awesome! Lysistrata Jones was entertaining and lovable; studentrush.org is still offering tickets for it at five dollars! As a slight adaptation from Aristophanes’ Lysistrata, Lysistrata Jones is about a high school girl (named Lysistrata Jones, of course) who is tired of her school’s basketball team relentlessly losing and, more specifically, not caring. So, with the idea planted in her head by a peer, she decides to do as Lysistrata (in Aristophanes’ play) does and “not give it up.” In other words, she refuses to have sex with her boyfriend until they finally win a game, and she gets some of her other friends to do it (or not do it…) with her. Some things go wrong, though, and relationships are tested. At first I was a little critical of the play. I definitely enjoyed it, but I did not necessarily appreciate the immature plot. One of my friends, on the other hand, LOVED it. He explained that in a Broadway play he looks for good choreography, dancing, and singing; and he was right! All three were phenomenal–especially the choreography. It was always in sync and kept my attention.
We got into a slight debate about what matters more: plot or the technical aspects of a musical (like choreography and singing). This reminded me of music: what matters more? the music or the lyrics? or is it 50/50? This probably affects your opinion of theater in general. If you’re especially interested in performance (as opposed to plot) I’d say GO SEE LYSISTRATA JONES!!! And the plot isn’t all that bad – it is entertaining!
Freshman Fail #4
0It’s the first semester of college, and I finally learn about a thing called Adobo. For any college student or adult recently on his/her own, it is a MUST. When you are learning to cook for the first time it is simply the easiest way to add flavor to food: chicken, veggies, pasta, anything. My friend, Emily, introduced it to my friends and I, and we immediately fell in love!
One day I was running late to my English class, so I quickly whipped up some pasta and put it in a container. Before covering it, I POURED Adobo on it. It was good, I figured, so why not put a TON?
Bottom line is I put way to much. It was nasty. Salty as heck. I tried mixing it, but since I hadn’t mixed it at first, it wasn’t spreading well and parts of it were saltier than others. I was starving, though, so I continued to eat. After a while it was too much to handle, so I stepped out of the classroom and walked over to the bathroom across the hall and rinsed the pasta in cold water. YES. I rinsed it. In the bathroom. When I finally got back to the class, I gave it a taste and it was much better… BUT it was cold. Clearly I was already having a FAIL, but I still tried to fix it. I got up during class again, crossed the hall to the Macaulay student lounge where there is a microwave, and I heated up the pasta. Some juniors there called me crazy, but I was convinced I could fix my mistake….
I thought I had a success! But I tasted it, and I realized one thing: FRESHMAN FAIL #4.
Lesson learned: As DELICIOUS and AMAZING and CONVENIENT as Adobo is, DO NOT POUR. Sprinkle =)
The Development of de Kooning
0Interestingly enough, the exhibition of de Kooning’s work in the Museum of Modern Art is the first exhibition devoted to such a full variation of his work. As a result, the most important idea to take away from the exhibit, asi
de from the meaningful intricacy of his work, is the development of his work over almost seven decades. The exhibit does an excellent job of portraying de Kooning’s development as an artist; when you first walk into the exhibit you can see his first works that he completed in his teens, and the rooms will lead you through a large scope of the works of his life chronologically.
The beginning of de Kooning’s journey as an artist includes three still lives, one of which is to the right. The pieces show variations of pots, cups, and bowls in a very detailed, realistic manner. They are simple, but they show de Kooning’s capabilities as a drawer quite evidently. He can undoubtedly create values and place shadows correctly.
Continuing to walk through the exhibition, you will find pieces like Woman I (1950) which is way more abstract than the still life pieces. He worked particularly long on this piece and repainted it many times until he finally settled for the image of a woman (image to the left). While his still life was simple, Woman I created some controversy. In a PBS interview remembering de Kooning, the controversy over paintings like Woman I was explained: “To conservative critics it was considered ugly; that he had so brutalized the human figure, particularly the female form. And to the more progressive and avant garde critics it seemed to be a repudiation of all he had fought for in terms of avant garde painting and the repudiation of his role as an abstract painter” (Online NewsHou
r: In Remembrance). But perhaps the fact that his pieces are left up for debate is the reason for their beauty.
Later, de Kooning began to paint pieces like Untitled XXII (1983). This piece (to the right) is much simpler, but it seems to have lines that are much more well thought out. Right in the center one might see a face with closed eyes (one red, one blue), a nose, and teeth below it. It is much more relaxed than his earlier pieces like Woman I.
Overall, de Koonings pieces are an excellent example in the argument of what can be considered art. One might look at Untitled XXII and say that anyone could do that; one might say that de Kooning really doesn’t show any talent. His still life paintings, however, prove that he has an extraordinary capability and talent. His development shows his growth in ability to express something more than just values and shadows.
To see a little more about his progression as an artist click here.