Procrastinaters UNITE..... Tomorrow!

    HEY ALL! So everyone has their own way of getting through the day, just like everyone has therir own unique fingerprint. This is no different with the way people finish a writing assignment or just write for fun. We all have our own way of getting through it. Personally, I do not completely stick to a rigid list of what I need to do, but I do have specific things that I need to do in order to get myself in the mindset of writing.
   Okay, so what you need to know about me is that I tend to majorly procrastinate. Not like to the point of not getting it done, but if I have a plan to lets just say write a draft for a writing assignment, I do whatever possible to delay the writing. First, I change into comfy sweatpants and a t-shirt because who can work in uncomfortable clothes? Not me! Next, I watch a little bit of my favorite TV shows like Criminal Minds or maybe just Sportscenter. After that, I nourish my brain with a snack and soomething to drink, otherwise I will not be able to think straigh with my stomach rumbling like a stampede of elephants. Next, I finish all lof my homework besides writing. Not because I am putting it off more or I am saving the best for last (well, maybe subconsciencely I am) but because I like to do the straightforward work first. I know approximately that Chem X takes me a half hour or less, AP Calc takes me an hour to an hour and a half, but it completely depends on the day how long it will take me to write.
    So I finally finish procrastinating and doing all of my other homework and I retreat to my bedroom. I can do my math and chem homework in front of the TV or while talking to my family, but there is no way that I can write with distractions. I am already distracted enough as it is, and I do not want another excuse to procrastinate. Although I write on my laptop in my room, I do not have a specific place that I write in there. Some days, I lay on my bed, some days I sit at my desk, some days I lay on the floor, sometimes I sit against my wall, and somedays I do a combination of the four.  As I begin to write, it may take me twenty minutes to write the first sentence; it all depends on how engaged my brain is. Typically, I write something, then delete it and write something then delete it all again. the Introduction takes me by far the most time to write. After I finally complete the dreaded introduction, I am usually in the groove and I spit out words and phrases right there on the spot. I am like a machine, well, not that good, but still. Sometimes, I still have to stop a few minutes and catch my breath, read over what I wrote and find something interesting to say.
   So I finished my rough draft, big deal! Next it is time to edite, edit, edit. This takes the mosst time by far because my writing is never even close to be perfect. First, I read through it, then I have my mom read through it. She used to be a teacher, so she edits the crap out of my so called writing. It deflates my ego everytime, yet it helps me to get a better grade, so I have to deal with it. If it is a big enough essay, then it goes to my friends for editing. Finally, I get it all back and incorporate the edits into my writing, and I finally edit it all by myself. This is actually almost identical to what happened in my huge rhetorical analysis paper! Fun stuff, huh??

Scared My Pants Off!!

    Hey all!!! This MEA weekend was the most fear filled weekend I have been through in a long time. October is the time of year in which everything is changing. The leaves are changing colors, the weather is changing from cold to colder, the activities are changing from outside to inside, sports are changing from baseball, to football, my mindset is changing from alert to less alert. Personally, my favorite part about October is Halloween and the spooky decorations and creepy air about the world. This weekend, was no different then any other weekend getting ready for Halloween.
   My Friday night began with Valley Scare (if you haven't gone, I absolutely recommend it.) Saturday was the night I saw Paranormal Activity 3! This weekend I jumped a minimum of 98,936 times just during that movie and Valley scare. Okay, so that was an exaggeration, but still I am surprised I didn't break down and curl into a little ball, rock back and forth, and cry for my mommy as I was going through those mazes. Luckily, I am not one of those people to get nightmares or freaked out by paranormal entities or crazy clowns with chainsaws. Instead, I just get a rush of adrenaline, ready to fight back, well at least if I have a friend or two to back me up in case the insane clown wont stop chasing me with his chainsaw.

   This is what my friends and I looked like during the movie! The last fifteen minutes actually had me clenching my friend's hands so hard. One of my guy friends, who usually tries to be the tough guy, was hiding behind me during those last frightful minutes. That shows how scary the movie actually was! Honestly, the movie was nothing like the trailers, which is a huge bummer, but it was still really suspenseful, and I recommend it to anyone who wants to get their pants scared off!
  So, I kind of went off on a tangent about my weekend, but the way I spent my weekend is the way that October should be spent. The change of season, should be spent with a change of mind. Everyone should attempt to cross over the line of what they would normally do, not in a bad way, but just in a brave way. October should, along with being national cancer awareness month, be national be brave month and try something new. My warrant you ask? Well, this may not be a good proposal, but trying something new is necessary to be successful, and sometimes people need that extra push to try something new and be brave. This way, people will be encourages to be brave and step out of their safe little bubble. Nobody has to be brave, but the idea of October being the month of trying something new will hopefully encourage everyone to be different and live in the Halloween spirit, and the change that comes with October.

Americans and the Average Joe

     Hey all! At this point in my high school career I have had the "opportunity" to watch the documentary 2 Million Minutes. During both of these "opportunities" I learned that Americans are slacking big time and that we need to up our games. According to the movie, Americans are especially slacking in the areas of math and science compared to the our Asian acquaintances.
    Did anyone notice how the people interviewed in two million minutes for our Asian counterparts were the top in their country? The Chinese boy, Xiaoyuan,  interviewed was a freaking genius, even in Asian standards. He was with in the top ten math students in his country! That is saying something! At the same time, the documentary interviewed two pretty great students from America, but not one of our top ten students; thus you cannot compare the American student, Neil, to the math whiz, Xiaoyuan. The directors of this documentary really utilized various logical fallacies. Besides being a hasty generalization by saying that ALL Americans are like Neil and ALL Chinese students are like Xiaoyuan, it is a faulty analogy because you cannot compare the best in one country with an above average student in another country. That just does not work. It is like comparing the best on one team to an average player on another team. Another apparent logical fallacy utilized was cherry picking. The directors only used certain facts about America's slacking math and science industry... what about all the other subjects and majors? Surprisingly, there is more to success then just excelling at math and science.
    By the end of the documentary, I noticed that both the Americans reached their gals, while the Asians did not. This shows that there is more to success then just school work. Americans are definitely more well rounded, we have other priorities besides just school. Personally, school is my number one priority, but it is not my ONLY priority, unlike in China and India where the documentary made it seem school was the only item on their list to do. Besides school, I have to make time for sports, volunteering, more sports, and hanging out with my family and friends. As the end of the documentary explains, Americans are more well-rounded. I think that is a good thing because there is more to life than just schoolwork. As a teenager, we need to live for the moment and enjoy these years while we still can before we have to become an adult and accept even more responsibilities.
   As i read the article, For Once Blame the Students, I agreed with most of it until I read I Just Wanna Be Average.  It is sometimes the students fault if they don't succeed because teachers can only take you so far but they cannot make one learn if they don't want to. Yet, it is the teacher's job to TEACH, and that is what they get paid to do, and if they aren't at least putting a substantial effort into helping the students learn, then they should have never gone into teaching. I know some students that come to school only because they have to show up, not because they want to get anything out of it. It is ashame because they have so much potential. If only one teacher would have come through to them like Mr. Macfarland did to Mike Rose in I Just Wanna Be Average, then those "slacker" students could have become something big. Yet, no teacher put enough effort into helping those students. I am not trying to blame the teachers because yes it is the students fault for not trying to learn, but some of them have never received the chance to shine and become more than just the below average student that they have been expected to be.
   I completely agree that many of my fellow AP students have fallen victim to the grade curse. All we care about is keeping our perfect 4.0 GPA or keeping it as high as possible. In someways this is a good thing because we are trying to meet the expectations that either our parents have set for us or we have set for ourselves. With expectations comes goals, and with goals comes pursuit and with pursuit comes success. Without expectations, no one would attempt to achieve success. They would be okay with just being the average Joe or even being less than average. Personally, expectations have helped me become what I am today. Along with the high expectations I have for myself, my parents have high expectations for me. Although that can be annoying at times, it makes me want to succeed and not let them down. I think everyone needs that one person who expects a lot of them, and those that do not have that one person are the ones that are okay with settling for just average. My challenge for everyone is not to be satisfied with just being average.

Let's Talk Baseball

     Hey all! This is probably old news to you, but about a week and a hallf ago I finally realized that the team I have adored and worshiped for my entire life is God awful! The Boston Red Sox lost 20 games in the month of September! I didn't know that was possible, except for maybe the Twins or some terrible team like that, but never did I believe my beloved team could fail so epicly. Here is the stunning end of Red Sox Nation's hopes and dreams of making the post-season once again.
    I am not sure if all of you know this but in 2004, the Red Sox finally overcame the 86 year slump that we were cursed with once we traded Babe Ruth to the Yankees. The Curse of the Bambino lay in the back of every Red Sox fan's mind down the stretch, heading towards the post-season. Every year after the All-Star break, we have a minor collapse, but never one as big as this year! The error that still lives in infamy for anyone that knows baseball is the dreaded error of Bill Buckner when in 1986 Worldseries the RedSox played the Mets. This was one of the many problems that the Red Sox encountered that Sox Nation blamed on the Curse. After this error Bill Buckner, led an isolated life, he was shunned by everyone who liked the Red Sox, and understandably because we were so close to winning a World Series ring (which would argueably would have happened if he did not make an error on a routine groundball.) Sox Nation was so bitter with him that Buckner received death threats and hate mail. I think we went way too far in threatening to end his life, I mean it is not like he meant to make an error, yet he did. After the Sox lost in the 86 World Series, Buckner was the immediate scapegoat for the loss, followed by a combination of having to relive the dreaded Curse of the Bambino and realizing the Red Sox are awful.


I would add 2011 to that one!

    I was actually embarrassed to say I am a part of Red Sox Nation. On the bright side, we made history, no team has ever lost as large of a lead as we had coming in to September. At the beginning of September we had almost a nine game lead over the Rays and had a 98.6% chance of making the playoff. We lost it all in less then a month. This was not a Rays win, it was a Sox loss. We were so awful in the month of September that Fenway faithful actually started to boo the team as they ran off the field after another dreadful loss! September was a horriffic month for everyone that even moderately likes the Red Sox, well there is always next year! With a new coach, we could be back on top as soon as the beginning of next season, but who is to say we won't lose it by the end??
    As I look back at the end of our season, I want to say that Jonathan Papelbon, the Red Sox closer, may be thought of as the next Bill Buckner. After all, he struck out two batters to begin the ninth and had two strikes on the next batter, but he choked. Just like Bill Buckner, he couldn't close it out. He gave up our lead; then he personally lost the game for us. Onbce again, the Curse of the Bambino is prevelant in Red Sox Nation.
   Don't get me wrong here everyone I am the biggest Sox fan you will ever meet! I know pretty much everything there is to know about them, you may say I have a little obsession... but oh well everyone has to be obsessed with something!

Yeah! Me too bud, me too!

OBAMA'S SPEECH

   Hello all!!!! Have any of you guys seen President Barack Obama's speech to students yet? If the answer is no, then stop reading and go watch it, then you can come back and read the rest of what I have to say! It is kind of long so give yourself some time to watch the entire speech. I literally watched it just a few minutes ago, and I thought his message was presented fairly well. The first thing I noticed when watching the speech was his voice and cadence. He makes his audience want to listen by not being monotonous, but using a lot of voice inflection while asking his audience to continue their education with as much of a positive attitude as possible. His tone seems serious and sincere, like he wants the best for his audience. Obama uses a lot of gestures in order to get his voice across. His gestures emphasize a certain point he wants to get across. A few times, he actually points at the audience to get the point across that he is talking to all the students out there.

  As I listened to his speech, there were many times that I heard him refer to the audience saying 'you' or 'we'. Saying 'we' captures ethos saying that he is there for the students and that he wants the best for all of them. As he refers to the audience as you, he gets the point across that he is talking directly to each one of the students, and that their education matters not only to them, but to the fate of our country as well. As president Obama was speaking, he used a variety of syntax at some points he varied from long sentences to short sentences in order to give the audience a break. He even listed off a few items and took pauses in between them as if they were the end of a sentence. For example, Obama states, "And it means that you take some risks once in a while. You wonder. You question. You explore. You color outside the lines every now and then." This gives the audience a break from his long and windy sentences. As seen in the example above he uses repetition/anaphora to emphasize that 'you' as a student can make a difference. Obama repeats the word you a million times, well I guess not that much, but you get the point. He repeats tons of pronouns like we, you, they, and much much more to show that the audience has a lot of supporters.
    Obama uses more rhetorical devices in his speech! He uses parallelism as he talks about the students' role in the country, "America needs your passion, your ideas, and your energy right at this moment." Obama uses this parallelism to really motivate the students and get them to want to pursue their education with optimism and high hopes.
  As I listened to the president, I thought if all the ethos, pathos, and logos he used. Most of the time, I saw him as attempting to gain credibility and ethos by showing the students that he was once just like them and that he understands what he they are going through. This is especially apparent when Obama talks about his ethics class and what he was like as an eight grader. He tries to be relatable by starting off his speech with "hey," instead of a more formal "good evening." Ethos is present whenever Obama is speaking because, after all, he is the President of the United States of America which probably makes him one of the most credible sources because he knows what he is talking about. He is a very educated man. Obama also uses some logos when he talks about facts about education and how everyone needs an education because 60 percent of jobs require more than a high school diploma. These are all logos because they are logical duh :)
  Obama ends his speech with motivational examples of students just like everyone else who have made a difference. He explains about one student, "Jake Bernstein, a 17-year-old from a military family in St. Louis, worked with his sister to launch a website devoted to community service for young people.  They’ve held volunteer fairs, put up an online database, and helped thousands of families find volunteer opportunities that range from maintaining nature trails to serving at local hospitals." After he explains about these amazing students he states that he needs all of us students to pitch in. He leaves us on this note because he wants us to end with the thought that we CAN make a difference in our community and it is our job to do so.
  Third grader Bryce Rees listens to Obama's speech :) he is adorable!