My American Studies

Progression

2009-06-01T11:20:00.005-05:00

I see tall, wind turbines. They are in the middle of what seems like a desolate area. I see around 30-40 wind turbines in a line. This picture conveys the progression of America because we are taking steps to find renewable energy. This shows hope that old ways of energy like coal, which emits dangerous chemicals into the atmosphere, and nuclear power, which poses the threat of what to do with the nuclear waste will become obsolete. This picture symbolizes how America is finding ways to better the planet and adapting to make smarter decisions for our future. People around the planet are working to make earth more lush and alive. for example i was watching this TV show about the most extreme bathrooms on the Travel channel and there was this one bathroom that used rain water that what purified through rocks and plants for the flushing of toilets and the sinks water that was used was also filtered the same way and used for the toilet. and yes there is more. the paper towels that are used are fed to worms so they can eat them and produce fertalizer instead of throwing away the towels. These ideas are helping to improve the world and save resources, just as the wind turbines are doing.

Teach For America Part II

2009-05-27T21:49:00.002-05:00

A long time ago i made a blog post about my brother and what he is doing in teach for america and how different inner city schools are from New Trier. This is just going to be a follow-up post on how the rest of the year went for him. First of all there are just a couple stories from my brother about how much different it is to teach at a school that is not as lucious as NT. He got punched in the face by one of his students, his computer was stolen, there have been many gang fights in the school, and yes a student even told him that he was going to send a hit out on my brother for calling his mother about his grade. I dont believe that any of this has ever happened at NT and people at our school should be thankfull for how good we have it. i know my brother,altough his job has its days, he has gotten alot of character and can use this experience to better his own life and recognize how hard some people have it. Even though the odds for being choosen to teach for america are extremely slim i would like to be apart of the program after college because knowing now what my brother knows i want to help out and maybe spread the way New Trier is to other schools that are not as lucky.

The End is Near!

2009-05-27T21:34:00.002-05:00

Yes the end of the school year is almost here and i can see the light at the end of the tunnel. But the problem is that as we get closer to the end of the year i begin to go into hibernation from school. seeing all of the seniors be done and them saying how good it feels to not have finals or worry about highschool anymore has kind of been burned into my brain and i feel that as i get closer to finals i am starting to become a senior among juniors. And this is a problem because i have borderline grades in almost all my classes. According to a comment by Adam the Great on Gordie's blog post he said that east coast schools have a rule that if you have an A in a class then you dont have to take the final of that class. i wish this happened at New Trier because people that get A's in classes obviously have worked hard in the class all year and they deserve to take a break at the end of the year. basically i dont like finals and i want to be a senior so i can wreak havoc on the fresh meat(sophomores).

Immigration

2009-05-21T22:41:00.003-05:00

So during the final weeks of school i thought that any video i watched during a class would be a joke. haha i was wrong, in spanish class we just finished the movie "El Norte" and we also watched a documentary called "Crossing Arizona", both of which were very eye opening. After watching the videos i am split 50-50 on my thoughts of immigration. Illegal immigrants are crossing the border to america in order to have a better life for themselves and their families, and in doing so they are doing the jobs that most americans would not want to do. so for this instance i believe that since they are making the long journey to america and risking life and death to help their family who cant afford barely anything. they should be helped and not deported. and people are helping the immigrants by putting out water and food for them were they normally cross. on the other hand i believe that immigrants have no place to stay in america, first of all they are taking jobs from some americans and getting benefits that most americans dont even have. the immigrants are also leaving many tons of trash where they are crossing and along the way are shooting cattle and just leaving them. this is wrong. i cannot make up my mind where i stand so i will stay in the middle.

Since we have been talking about the flag alot recently something surpirised me during the videos. for one during a protests to stop immigrants from crossing the border many people were carrying the american flag and a couple from washington said they were never patriotic untill they got associated in the protest. So is that what it takes for people to be patriotic?

Questions for the audience

2009-05-13T23:07:00.003-05:00

I really enjoyed american studies day, although all of the classes were great i liked louis masur and mississippi heat the best. Masur speech was very interesting and got me thinking, and i had some questions that i would like you to answer. Is a staged photo as powerfull as a original non-staged photo? Does cropping a photo ruin the true meaning of the photo? And what is more memorable a video or a picture? I will be making another blog post answering these questions for myself but i want to hear what you have to say first.

Patriotic sweet dreams

2009-05-10T23:04:00.003-05:00

As we have been learning about what we feel the flag symbolizes in class it really made my thinking juices start flowing. people said that it symbolizes peace or hope or freedom and should not be wrongfully used like on napkins. while i believe that alot of people think the flag symbolizes these things I, on the contrary, feel a little bit different. i think that the flag is just an identity of a country. every country has different colors and different representations on the flag, and this identifies a country. i also believe that it is not wrong to use a flag on a towel or napkin because it is just a drawing and not the real thing. now if a person took a flag down from a flagpole just to wipe off their face on it then that would be disrespectful

Our assignment was to find a flag and photograph it. i had never really critically looked around to see flags but this weekend i did. one thing i saw was American flag covers on a bed. Who would not want to sleep in the flags of their country? i feel that these covers were not meant to spark a big controversy or even make you second guess the fact that there are flags. i believe that covers were made just for decoration. I dont think that there can be anything said about them like the walls are a lighter blue then the blue in the flags so that means america is darker then the outside or something like that. there is although one problem i saw with the flags, instead of having stars it has really small stars and half moons. why would there be a need to chnage the flag for these covers anyways?

Obesity is the theme

2009-04-21T09:59:00.006-05:00

As i was doing research i learned a new thing about my topic. according to the article i read it turns out that obesity and overweight problems started when our ancestors started to use agriculture and farming instead of hunting. When humans first walked the earth there was a scarcity of food and people worked hard to get that food. everything that tasted good they would try to eat. but even as they were getting this food they were running or working increadible hard to get it, and the game they ate were much lower in fat then today. but the problem of obeseity started when agriculture was invented, even though they had more food the food did not have as many benefits as wild food and had more fat, as a result of this our early ancestors had calcium deficiencies, artery clogging problems, and other health related problems. but even though they had agriculture they were still working and doing physical labor. even though they had these obesity related problems obesity really kicked into higher gear when vehicles were invented and completely removed physical exercise from our lifestyle.

Junior Theme

2009-04-08T08:55:00.002-05:00

So i started my junior theme and quite frankly i am pleased. my why question is Why are americans becomming increasingly obese? and my book is called "In Defense of Food" by Michael Pollan, who i hope to have my interview with. during the 1980's food were being taken off the shelves and being replaced by cholesterol, fiber, and saturated fats, and this can lead to different health diseases and obesesity. before "foods" were being replaced the obesity rate in america was much lower then it is today. today people are eating more bad foods and not execising, they are eating by themselves or shoved in front of a television. when people eat they should eat to the point where they are not hungry and not to the point where they are completely full. also just because you eat healthy food doesnt mean you are not going to be obese, people are increasingly eating more and more quantities of healthy foods at each sitting, and in reality this does nothing. the growth of fastfood restaurants causes people to take in almost two-thirds of their daily calorie intake in just one meal. during 1998, 97 million adults (55% of the adult population) were obese. to add to this there were around 300,00 deaths annually due to obesity.

Drugs

2009-04-03T09:56:00.002-05:00

I just switched topics from drugs to food and obesity and since i am not writing about drugs in my paper i would like to say what i wanted to say now. My topic was why are some drugs illegal while others are legalized? I thought that it was a little arbitrary that marijuana was illegal when alcohol which also is a drug is legal. It doesnt make sense that people can drink and get extremely intoxicated and put their health and others at risk, and people can not smoke marijuana and just sit in someones house. Now i have never done drugs and i would like to make that clear, but i feel that marijuana should be legalized. First it would cut back on alot of crime and gang violence and in turn might make alot of places safer. second underground selling of marijuana makes billions of dollars that is just going to more getting and selling more drugs. i believe that the government could legalize the drug and tax it as alcohol is, and this might help make the economy better. also roughly 50% of the nation has tried marijuana and if that many people have tried it and bought it then why not legalize it? i believe that the drug would then be very useful for people that have chronic pain and would reduce the pain they have. the people would not have to worry about possessing it and using it also.

Horrible

2009-03-02T20:15:00.003-06:00

As i was driving home today i recieved a text message that stunned me. Just a couple blocks from my house a man killed his wife, son, and then killed himself. i never thought anything like this would happen so close to where i live and i feel so sad for the family and relatives of these people. i dont understand how a father could do that to the rest of his family. the mom and son had the house as a safe haven and i would believe they never felt in danger at their house, and yet the father took that away from them. i thought that my neighborhood and area around where i live nothing would ever happen like this. i send out my prayers and sympathy for the relatives and friends of this family.

Clint Eastwood

2009-02-08T23:44:00.003-06:00

Who, in this day and age, is like a cowboy according to mythology? one name came to mind and that was clint eastwood. he is tough, does not look like he has any emotion on his face and he is always the "cowboy type" in his movies.I always thought growing up that cowboys were the indian killing, unemotional, tough guys. i believe that is what alot of people thought too. during class on friday we read an article about what cowboys really were like. it said that they were sensitive, did not kill indians, and just drove cattle. the first actual cowboys were also mexican and african american unlike the white cowboy that is portrayed today. but how did these cattle driving cowboys get changed to what they are viewed as today?

Welcome Mr.President

2009-01-20T22:16:00.002-06:00

I only got to watch a little bit of the ingauguration but what i saw was very powerfull. to see an african american president walk out after white president really shows the change that is happening to the country before Obama even takes the office. As usual Obama's speech was well written and well spoken, i especially liked the part where he said "we have to get up and dust ourselves off". this is true, after Bush we really do have to rebound, forget the past and move forward. The inauguration was nearly perfect except for the exception of the oath mess up where "execute" and "faithfully" were mixed up. although it was a day for hope, celebration, and change when Bush came out he was boooed and people were singing "na na na na hey hey hey goodbye" i feel like this should not have happened because the day was for Obama and Biden not to criticize Bush. i also only watched a little bit of the inaugural balls but i thought it was funny when Obama was dancing at the first party and there was a circle of secret service people around him dancing as well.

Inauguration Celebration

2009-01-19T22:49:00.003-06:00

Over the weekend i watched the Presidential Inauguration concert, and it was amazing. there were so many awesome famous people that gave speeches and sang patriotic songs. and also there were so many people that were in front of the Lincoln Memorial. it amazes me that for the actual inauguration there wiil be even more people there. the whole concert just made me feel good. and it seemed the same for the audience who started channting "Obama" over and over again. it was very powerful to see that many people doing a chant for one person. there were a couple of things that i laughed about during the concert. during some of the performances Obama was standing up clapping and dancing, he seemed very loose and comfortable, it was very funny to me. also another thing i thought was funny was when beyonce came on stage one of Obama's daughters started taking pictures of her(this was after she seemed very bored the whole time before). it was as if the girl would never see beyonce again even though her dad is the president. if she wanted she could hang out with beyonce let alone just take pictures of her. but over all i thought the concert was a very compelling experience to watch and i am very excited to watch the actual inauguration that is coming up.

Finals Finals Finals

2009-01-07T22:03:00.003-06:00

I think i stand for everyone when i say that finals week is the worst week of the entire school year. Finals are just off of break so people are still trying to get back to the mode where they go to bed before 2am. And the winter does not help, it just makes things much more gloomy. During junior year students really work hard to get a good score on the ACT, and the thought of studying for the ACT and finals just makes you want to quit school(not that i would want to do that). And it also does not help that New Trier is a hard school. my mom was talking to a New Trier alum that had just gotten a teahcing job at another school and he said that college was a breeze compared to NT. That statement always gives you a warm feeling inside doesnt it?

Happy New Year!

2009-01-06T22:23:00.002-06:00

It is now the year 2009 and it should be a good one. Whether it is a new president in office or the superbowl i am excited to see what happens. And along with the new year comes resolutions. People always say they are going to acheive their resolution, and it never happens. For instance lets say a person's resolution is to do better in school. They come to school fresh off of break put their papers into new binders, organize the desk they should be doing their homework at night but never do and go into see their teachers more often. This happens for about a week and then it is bye bye to the resolution. They get home from school one day and sit down to do their homework at the desk they cleaned and of course they say to themselves, whatever i can do this later tonight. When later that night comes they say again, whatever i can just do it tomorrow during a free period. And just like that they are back to their normal selves. I think that new years resolutions are very hard to keep and i applaud that people that do follow through on them. But for me i have decided to take this year off on a resolution, i want to keep my mind free and not be worried if i break my resolution.

Tokenism

2009-01-06T21:34:00.002-06:00

After all the talk about tokenism in modern day dramas it really made me think critically about how this was going on. during class we were asked the question if anyone knew a TV show that had an african american person as the main character. frankly i could not. the closest thing i could think of was in the tv series Friday Night Lights. For each episode of the show it seems that there is a new main character. one episode it is the white coach or the white quarterback and another episode it is a african american runningback. this is the only show that i have seen someone african american take the role of main character for some episodes. i feel that this is wrong, the fact that people even think about how many diffent races are on shows makes me angry. everyone is an equal person and when it comes to picking a role for a network drama they should just pick the people that have the best talent. i have always wondered, what if there was a tv that featured a cast of african americans, would there need to be the token white person? This discussion in class stirred up another thing inside for me. i watch my fair share of TV and i have noticed there are never any red haired people. everyone either has brown, blonde, or black hair. never orange. i feel as a person of the red haired community there should be more red haired people on TV. Along with my question before about the token white person i also would like to ask if there should be a token red head.

The Big Daddy

2009-01-04T23:10:00.003-06:00

O Yeah the BCS championship game is just around the corner and i cant wait. After watching most of the bowl games over break i expect the match up between Oklahoma and Florida to be a great battle. but before i talk about this i would like to bring up some of the other bowl games. it was a dissapointment to the Big Ten having Penn State lose to USC. USC is always a power house team and they really showed in this game. Penn State could not do anything against their good defense and struggled to stop USC great offense. There were many upsets during this week like Ole Miss over Texas Tech and Utah over Alabama. The Utah game was great, i love seeing the underdogs win big. Utah finished the season undefeated and beat Alabama who was ranked number 1 in country for 5 weeks. Utah racked up 11 sacks on the quarterback John Parker Wilson, and the defense shut down the powerhouse team. Alabama was hurt on the offensive line because arguably the best lineman in the nation was suspended due to taking to an agent about the draft. What a shame for Alabama haha. Another game that i enjoyed watching was the Buffalo vs. UConn. buffalo was playing for their 1958 team that made it to a bowl game but refused to go because two black players were not allowed to play in the game. Buffalo started out strong but could not stop the run. Donald Brown had over 200 yards rushing against Buffalo in just the third quarter. Buffalo lost and i felt bad for them. ok on to the big game. Florida against Oklahoma. heisman winner sam bradford versus last years heisman tim tebow. this will be a very good game and i hope will be the closest out of all the bowl games. floridas dominating defense will have to be able to stop the passing attack of bradford who threw for over 4000 yards and had 48 tds. but on the otherhand the oklahoma defense will have to stop the lightning fast speed of percy harvin and the amazing player in tim tebow. this should be good.

chimpanzee attack

2009-01-04T22:33:00.002-06:00

I went to the lincoln park zoo over break, and the monkey house really amazed me. as i was standing watching some of the chimapnzees peacefully sleep i overheard people saying how much the chimps looked like humans. i saw this too, not only did they look like humans it was amazing how they slept like humans too. they would lay on their sides, backs and stomachs just as humans do. i thought they were very peacefull and nice until i read a story about a chimp. on march 3, 2005 james davis was going to visit his monkey he had at an animal haven. he had this chimp for 39 years and was going to visit it for the chimps birthday. as he entered the haven he was greeted by two chimpanzees that has escaped and attacked him. the chimps completely mutilated the man. he lost his eye, all of his fingers, part of his nose, lips cheeks, butt, his foot was badly mutilated and so was his genitals. he survived but had serious injuries and had to have extensive surgery. i cant help but to think that those peaceful animals that everyone stares at at zoos could almost kill a man. i have heard other stories of monkeys attacking people and it amazes me. to think that we evolved from these animals and we are not that much different. we evolved from something that completely mutilated a human. i wonder what people would be like if we evolved from like sharks or bears.

wonderful time of the year

2009-01-04T22:22:00.002-06:00

for me the holiday season really is the best time of the year. we get two weeks off to spend time with family and relatives and just relax. this is exactly what i did all break and it was perfect. but during this time it bothered me hearing all of these stories of what people got as presents. i know for my family we really cut back this year on how much we spent on presents but i see other families spending bunches of money on things that i would never think people would buy at a time like this. for one, the tax in cook county is outrageous, you could buy rock band for $189 but the tax would bring it up to $208. i dont know about you but i think $19 of tax is a little much. second since the economy has been down people have been losing money left and right. i feel that spending a ton of money on something right now would be very stupid. and anyways the point of the holiday season is not just to go out and spend money, i would rather be with my family then recieve anything for christmas, but that is just me.

Michigan Big Stink

2008-10-22T10:25:00.003-05:00

I have been a Michigan fan ever since i was a kid. lloyd carr was not doing so great so they fired him and hired rich rodriguez. naturally i was excited and thought that the new coach would bring out a powerhouse football team. i was wrong not only do i dislike rich but so does all of the other football coaches at michigan. this year has been a huge dissapointment, michigan has lost 5 games and only won 2. they are rated 8th out of 11 teams in the big ten. at the beginning of the season sam mcguffie a running back was recruited he was amazing during highschool but this year he has not been doing so well and i think it is because of his team. i feel bad for him because i feel like he could be an all-star player. also after watching the games i feel like the michigan team looks slow. they definetly do not look as fast as they were 2 years ago when they had mike hart, chad henne, braylon edwards, and lamar woodley. i have deemed this year to be a failure for the wolverines and i cant help but to look forward to next season where they are recruiting a new quarterback who is supposed to be amazing.

Opinion

2008-10-21T22:15:00.003-05:00

This post might seen boring to some and others can call me a nerd, but i dont care. Video games. i enjoy them immensly. i am not just a guy that plays sports games i play the good ones. i was talking to a friend of mine about a new game that was coming out. he said it was going to be sweet and he couldnt wait to buy it for 60 bucks. i had heard of the game and i thought it was going to be horrible. i even guessed the correct score it recieved out of 10 correctly a 7.5. i read some reviews and told him that the game was going to suck and he shouldnt get it. he retaliated back at me saying that it was my opinion that the game was bad. i brought up the fact that it got bad reviews from profesional gamers who rate games for a living and still he told me it did not matter because all of those reviews are just opinions, and that he thought the game was good even though it was horrible. he would not even budge to agree with the professionals the littlest bit. i then asked him do you agree with the grammys and that the movie that wins best picture could be horrible in another persons eyes. he said yes because it is their own opinion and the movie that won the award is an opinion from a bunch of people. i guess what i am trying to say is since everything is an opinion then are all award seremonies fair? just because the profesionals think something, doesnt mean the rest of the public does. how is it fair then that different video games can win awards when the average joe did not like it?

Grizzly Man meet Kayake Man

2008-10-20T22:27:00.004-05:00

Over the weekend i watched a television show called Solo Lost At Sea on the National Geographic Channel. as i started watching the program i was able to connect the show to Grizzly Man and Into the Wild. the show was about a man named Andrew McAuley who craved adventure. he rock climbed in deserts, climbed mountains, but one of his biggest passions was kayaking. his big plan was to kayake from tasmania to new zealand by going across the tasman sea. not only would he be at sea for over a month to reach his destination but the tasman sea is a very dangerous and trecherous. at times during storms waves can get as high as 39 feet. he knew there was a huge possiblity that he could die while trying to complete this task and yet he went ahead with it,leaving his wife and young son to nervously wait for andrews arrival at the end of his trip. ultimitely the andrew died about 75 kilometers away from land. i felt that this connected to Grizzley Man and Into The Wild in the sense that all of the main characters left people they loved in order to do what they loved, which was dangerous. they knew they had a possiblity of dying but they had a passion. they went into dangerous situations and ended up dying. some people called timothy treadwell "crazy" but this is where i disagree with a connection to andrew. i feel that he was not crazy but instead selfish, i dont feel bad for him dying, i feel bad that he left his son to grow up without a father and a wife that cant sleep at night because she is tramatized from the situation.

The Unkown Ocean

2008-10-05T22:14:00.003-05:00

As i was flipping through channels while watching tv, i stopped at my favorite station. the Discovery Channel. the show that was playing was about a collosal squid. i have wanted to be a marine biologsit since i was a kid so natural i took notice. the squid happened to be about 20 feet long and had am eye with a diameter of 10 inches. these animals are very rare and only one living has ever been caught on camera. this amazed me. i guess my point is not just about a squid but instead about the unknown. the ocean is huge and home to many different types of living organisms. but as human i dont believe that we have even gotten close to classifying the different types of animals that reside in the deep. for all we know these colassal squids could be very common in an area but we may never discover this because the ocean is so vast. i feel that we as humans should be discovering these areas and finding out new groundbreaking information everyday because since the earth has so much more water then land, who knows maybe some day we will be trying to live at the bottom of the ocean instead of mars. on a different note i have also become very interested in the Challenger deep. this is the deepest spot in the ocean. the trench goes down 7 miles. right now it would be impossible to travel to these depths because of the pressure but i feel that once we get the the technology to go down there we will see a different world. for all we know there could be 100 ft. squids and animals that resemble those of prehistoric times. and maybe living down there could be the gigantic megladon shark that is said to be extinct andt would consider even the great white shark to be a bite size snack.

scary year

2008-09-22T21:07:00.002-05:00

i always hear that junior year is the hardest year.i get that statement into my mind and i think that i am going to do great. but i start procrastinating, i tell myself that i can do bad on test in the beginning of the year because i will fix myself and do better towards the end. this is wrong i end up freaking out and getting the deep disgust that i could have done better. i hate that feeling. i want to change and i say i am going to study hard and work hard, but i get home and sit down which is a big mistake. i want to go to a good college and set up a good life for myself but at times i just tell myself that i am screwing up. i look at students that get really good test grades and work hard and to tell you the truth i am jealous of these people more then anyone else. but at the same time i am killing myself inside because i know i can be one of those "good" students i am just no doing as good as i truly could. i get good grades but i just dont think it is enough. i feel like this problem happens to alot of students, and i think most of them care.

New Trier has no idea

2008-09-14T21:16:00.004-05:00

i constantly hear students complaining about, new trier, arguably one of the best highschools in the nation, and this makes me sick. the fact that people even complain about this school is ridiculous because it has so much more then most schools. the ones who should be complaining are the students of inner city schools that have nothing. i have a brother who is currently doing Teach for America. this is a program where applicants are chosen to teach at not your typical good area. he resides in memphis right now and is teaching at one of the worst schools in the city. not only does the school have bad funding but the atmosphere that the students live in is not making any matters better. the classes have many students and there is not enough materials for each student. my brother is a chemistry teacher and he doesnt even have enough materials to do demos or even labs. yet on the other hand nths is not going to now or even in the near future have a problem with getting enough materials for students and teachers. newtriers atmosphere is great and i will slap anyone in the face that says they dont feel safe at this school. my brothers highschool on the other hand is not very safe. students pull fire alarms in order to go outside and have gang fights for initiation into either the bloods or the crips. even teachers get punched in the face for gang initiation. i dont know about you but after i think about these situations and think about how hard it would be to grow up without materials and live in a bad atmosphere it would not even cross my mind to complain about newtrier.

Like Father Like Son

2008-09-07T22:05:00.003-05:00

If any of you dont know who Lou Holtz is, lets just say he is one of the best football coaches of all time. If any of you dont know who his son is, lets just say he has already made a big impact in the NCAA football league this year. Skip Holtz the coach of East Carolina and his team have started off the season 2-0. but this is not just any old 2-0, east carolina has defeated two ranked teams and they are looking strong. they first beat the #17 Virginia Tech 27-22. and second they had an impressive win over the #8 West Virgina 24-3, where they stopped Pat White to only 72 passing yards. on the other hand Patrick Pinkney threw for 236 yards(espn.com). this team looks strong and after looking at the rest of their schedule, i dont think that ECU could lose a game this year. skip holtz is coaching like his father and defeating teams that were ranked and supposed to trample ECU.

test blog

2008-09-03T09:18:00.001-05:00

test blog my name is brian