2nd semester goals

Goals 

My goals for this semester are to get a 85 over all (at least) in every class for many reasons, but mainly because a sense of accomplishment always feels good when you have been through something as long as a school year.  Also to just avoid any kind of trouble as I have some minor trouble with in the past. 

Question 1:  How are you different now then when you started school in August?

I think I am different now in a way that makes me look like I have a sense of urgency.  In previous years I settled for the minimum in most of my pieces of work and when ever something was due soon I would lay back and do it a good portion of the time but the times it didn't it hit hard so a sense of urgency did kick in but too late but after seeing all that I feel like I can force that feeling on my self to make me seem a bit more productive because I have to now more than ever

Question 2.  What skills do you think are the most important for succeeding in humanities?Why?

Well first of all you have to have the will to learn after the rest of the skills start to come to you pretty easily.  Next to that you have to have some kind of researching skills as our previous project showed us.  Simply because humanities is about history, literature, and writing.  So for the writing portion you would need researching a lot since you need to inform your self.  Not just being able to read stuff but to pick out the important details and be able to understand the work.  Also study skills, to able to learn something important efficiently and how to summarize different kinds of information.  Like studying math if different than history so you have to able to know how to study different formats of material.  

Question 3:  One thing you would like to improve on

I would like to improve my work ethic a bit.  Primarily at home because I can honestly say I think I work pretty efficiently at school but at home I have too many distractions.  So I would like to turn off the computer volume and put on headphones to keep anything else from getting my attention which would keep me locked on my work

Question 4:  What are you most curious about?  If you could study any topic, what would you study and why?

If anything I would like to study genetics.  I don't know a lot about the topic but form what I do know it seems very interesting.  Also because it's nice to have that kind of knowledge to know that you could help someone with what could previously have been called an "incurable affliction"   

1. To achieve a 85 or better in all classes

2. To watch any Superbowl in person

3.  Live to see a Charger Superbowl win

4.  To get my DP up to speed and make sure all it's links are working 

5.  Get all my WOW characters to the level cap before the start of next year

6.  To make more friends

7.  To go to Washington D.C

8.  To go to Brazil

9.  To go on road trip with my friends 

10.  To go to college and get a doctorate

Dialectic Journal (Final) Gates of Fire

Journal 1 book 7 

Part of text:  Directly above rose a copse of oak, lit by-iron cressets howling in the gale, and beyond, past a single picket line of Egyptian marines, could be glimpsed the pennanted kingposts of a pavillion so vast it looked like it housed a battalion.  "That's it."  Rooster pointed.  "That's Xerxes' tent."  

Response:  First of all it was nice how the Pressfield describes the place to almost exagerate it.  Also it was nice how it left the chapter in suspense to make the reader want to keep on reading.  

Journal 2 book 7

Part of text:  The warrior's thoughts at the brink of action, my master had often observed (as the student of fear he ever declared himself to be), follow a pattern unvarying and ineluctable.  There appears always an interval, often brief as a heartbeat, wherein the inward eye summons the following tripartite vision, often in the selfsame order: 

Response:  This kind of brings in the element of Spartan training that they do early on in life that is somewhat explained in the contents of the book (primarily in the beggining) but it kind of explains how they get in the zone before they strike at their enemies.  

Journal 1 book 8 

Part of text:  As when a hailstorm descends unseasonably from the mountains and hurls from the sky its icy pellets upon the husbandman's newly sprouted crop, so did the bolts of the Persians in their myriads thunder down upon the Spartans and Thespians.  Now the farmers assumes his anxious station in the doorway, hearing the deluge upon the titles of the roof, watching its bullets of ice clatter and rebound upon the stones of the walk.  How fare the sprouts of spring barley?  One here and there survives, as if by miracle, and holds yet its head aloft.  But the planter knows this state of clemency cannot endure.  He turns his face away, in obedience to the laws of god, while without, beneath the storm, the final shaft breaks and falls, overwhelmed by the insuperable onslaught of heaven 

Response:  This is another example of building suspense it leaves kind of a gap in the story.  The simile in the text is also nice as they compare the arrows that supposedly "block out the sun", as they compare it to hail.  Also describing the arrows hitting sheilds.  

Journal 2 book 8:  Such was the end of Leonidas and the defenders of the pass at Thermopyle, as it related by the Greek Xeones and complied in transcription by his Majesty's historaian Gobartes the son of Artabazos and completed the fourth day of Arahsamnu, year five of his majesty's accension.  

Response:  This seems like a very nice semi-emotinal way to start the ending the book.  The way they even start in with just this paragrph with simple words like "such" when put in context like this make the story come to epic proportions.  

What I'm thankful for

I am very thankful that my parents still have a job considering the trashy economy 

I am thankful for still having a house and Internet access 

I am thankful for still being alive and having my health 

and finally I am thankful for being me

Dialectical journal (End of book 1 GOF)

Chapter four phrase:  I will append the observation only, from the horror-benumbed apprehension of a boy shorn at one blow of mother and father, family, clan, tribe and city, that this was the first time my eyes had beheld those sights which experiences teaches are common to all battles and all slaughters

Response:  This just reminded me of the fact that even though he was born a Spartan and admitted into thier ranks at birth, this makes me think he is experincing some of the mental and spiritual conditining that the rest of the spartans have to go through.  Even though the training is a little different I personally think that this is not the same thing but again I feel this is kind of the gist of it.   

Chapter 5 phrase: I had made myself an infantryman's spear, stout ash and fire hardened, no longer a boy's toy but a weapon meant to kill.  Visions of revenge fed my heart.  I would live among the spartans.  I would slay Argives one day.  

Response:  Just like I have stated in the previous response he can almost feel himself reverting to primal instinct.  When having to live out in the wild (just like the spartans) the only thing he can think of at that moment is the thought of vengance.  This at the same time brought up the question of "How long has it been since his home was razed?" and somthing earlier in the chapter which might seem irrelevant but what does "agrotera" mean?

Chapter 6 phrase:  I blinked and tried with all my failing power to focus .(irrelevant entry for about a paragrph).  His eyes met mine with a gentle, amused kindness.  "  I have always found the spear to be," he spoke with a quiet majesty that could be nothing other than the voice of a god "a rather inelegant weapon"  

Response:  The part I wanted to respond too was about a page long and I will try to make due without it.

Text like this part always sparks my interest.  When he knows he can't use a spear it basically crushes his dream of ever being in a spartan phalanx.  But during this supposed dream he has a dream in which he is told to use a bow.  I have read this part before so there is not much to say 

but it always catches my attention.  

The question this brought up was:

I know this is Historical fiction but what could make you see like that besides a dream?

Election 2008 blog

Well politics so far have been not what they used to be. They have become insulting and harsh towards people's opponents. This year's presidential election has not been about what candidates are going to do. But instead focus on what the other candidate might not do. It is all attacks on the other person (as was pointed out in the latest debate).

As far as I can tell this year's election will be a close one. There is no obvious winner. Not only have the meaning of "politics" changed over the years but some people have voted but the people that vote are not always paying close attention. All people can agree we want a good president that actually keeps thier promises to the people. But what some people look for is a different president and just hope to get a good president elected. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/uselection2008/presidentialdebates/3091056/Presidential-debate-verdict-No-clear-winner-between-John-McCain-and-Barack-Obama.html

Overall elections have changed completly since this system of goverment was established in the United States. For the most part, not in a good way. Pointing out that the downsides of your opponent does not make you a good president but only make you look better than the other person.

Blog 2/2

The man on the left is my father. He is the hero I wrote about. Right here is an example of how even when we do something wrong he always manages to teach a life lesson for a positive reason. All it ends up taking is a little understanding on his part.

Blog Post 1/2 (Picture veiwing)

I really like this photo becuase it Antonio Gates is my favorite player (the one catching the ball).  I think this says a lot about him.  First of all when you have that much room to catch the ball most people to show off will for somthing fancy like jump and try and reel it in with one out streched arm.  But showing how he went for a simple catch shows that he is a very modest person.  Secondly you can see this was not an easy catch since it came from a diagnol angle from his body.  Every football player has a little celbration after every touchdown, but this man right here has very few.  So point is he is not big on showing of what masssive talent he has.  Also he is using his hands in a very tucked in position and not making the play look huge by stretching them out and making the play look big.