Opera

Normally, I'm not a big fan of opera. If i was forced to endure an hour of yodel-like opera, i would probably have to kill myself. As for classical music, i can sit through it and occasionally enjoy it, but i don't listen to it on my own. What i mean by this is that my dad listens to classical music and a lot of times i hear it.

Well, for Mr. Ayers' class we've been working on a video essay. Part of the requirement is to put music in the essay as well as words to relay emotion. We did our essay about ping pong. I think ultimately it is an informal essay, even though it does include other genres such as action and comedy among other things. Anyways, at the end we (me and my co-producer) have an epic last match where we wanted some very climatic music. I had an idea of a song called Lux aeterna. The thing is the song is part opera part, part classical music. This is probably the only exception to my dislike of Opera, and it's only part opera.

All in all, this is in my opinion the most epic music around. This can send shivers down your spine, especially when its paired up with the appropriate scenes.


To check out this song click on this LINK

Sumer

I am in desperate need of sumer. It's been too long; as a matter of fact i think that its been so long that I'm not even sure if i spelled sumer right. Oh well that doesn't matter. All that matters is that school finishes and i get a nice long 3 month break from everything. What I'm going to do with the 3 month I'm not sure yet, but as long as I'm not required to do anything, then I'll be happy.

I do have some vague plans for sumer though. I plan on getting a job to make some money. I also have a lot of football practice and weight lifting that will keep me busy and in shape during the sumer. Aside from lifting and practice, I', looking forward to a lot of pick up games (football, basketball, and probably some soccer too).

As far as an actual vacation i don't think my family has one planned, but who knows, maybe they'll surprise me. I remember hearing bits here and there about New York, and to be honest, i wouldn't be surprised if we went somewhere out of the blue. Just over memorial day weekend, we left to Minnesota. We left Saturday, but i didn't find out about it until Friday; it's great being so prepared.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining. As long as i have 3 months of nothing to look forward to, i don't care how many surprises show up, as long as i don't have school.

I need a topic

Don't you hate it when you desperately need a topic and it just wont come to you. Ive had that happen to me a couple of time this year, and it sucks. You find yourself just staring at the screen and thinking forever just to come up with a topic. More often than not, it means that when you do think up of a topic, it'll probably just be about something in the room like a printer or how comfortable the chair you are sitting on is. Sometimes you're not that lucky. If you cant think of a topic, you Will probably have to just work on something else until you can think of something or else make a blog post about something REALLY boring.

Even if you are really good at making up topics, you'll find that you start running out of them after about a years worth of entries. This was at one point the case with me. I found that i was quickly running out of topics, even though i was good at coming up with them. So i decided to use a method that would make this task more manageable in the regard of thinking up of topics. The method is writing about topics that are recent; in other words you just write about a topic that has happened to you recently. This makes it easy because 1) it just happened, so its easy to remember and 2) its easy to write about because its recent and it's dealing with you so you'll obviously know something about it.

I guess if you wanted to, you could look at this blog site as an electronic diary. No, actually it's a MANDATORY diary, which is why i'm able to sleep at night. But i dont like to look at it that way. I like to think of it more as an easy assignment that will boost my grade. Either way, only a couple more entries and it wont be a problem anymore.

youtube

Just today i was introduced to probably the best photo essay I've ever seen. It's about a normal teenage kid who has trouble in gym class. OK well maybe he's not that normal walking around playing game boy, and with his polo tucked into swimming trunk (?). But anyways, he goes to his gym class and the gym teacher picks him to do some athletics and he fails horribly. Suddenly the whole world, it seems, is laughing at him. He gets depressed for a while and cries for a while. Then he decides that it's time to get big. So he finds himself in a weight room steadily increasing the weight used for curling. next he does some intense bench, and some hardcore running. After 2 weeks, and a lot of protein, he is in the best shape of his life, and is ready to show that gym teacher what's up. So the following day he goes to gym determined and pumped, waiting for his chance. The gym teacher chooses him to do the activity (running on a treadmill). So he gets on the treadmill and runs until the teacher is satisfied. Then he gets of the treadmill and jumps around in jubilation, thus accomplishing his dream.


to watch this photo essay click on this LINK

Sick to the stomach

The other day I found myself throwing up at 5:30 in the morning. It was weird because i didnt even feel sick at the time; i just all of a sudden felt something rising up, and i couldnt keep it down, so i rushed to the bathroom and let it spray all over in the sink. That was a mistake; i should have done it in the toilet, because the sink was a pain to clean. Anyways, since i was up i thought about just getting ready and going to school. But then i thought, "Stupid, you just threw up, you dont have to go to school". So then i just went back to lay in bed. This was a smart choice because i just went on to throw up another 3 times; i think the reason it stopped after that is because there was nothing left to throw up.

Anyways, i was sick at home and i just layed in bed the whole day, and the day after. i didnt eat anything the whole time, and barely drank any water. my dad kept saying things like "you need to stay hydrated" and "keep drinking even if you feel like you're going to throw up". So he went out and bought me a lot of gatorade bottes, which i practically lived on for the next 2 days while i was laying in bed. The weird thing was that i could probably have drank it all day, because of my 102 degree temprature.

Contagious Yawn

You might not know it, but yawns are contagious. That's right. if you subconsciously see someone yawn, you will find yourself yawning. I'm willing to bet that a great number of the yawns that you have ever made are because you subconsciously saw someone else do it. If you dont believe it, you can just try it out on yourself or someone else. for example, go talk to someone and fervently slide in a yawn while you are in the middle of speaking with them, and you will see that they will not be able to hold back a yawn (considering that they dont know what youre up to).

There is also that new pepsi commmercial that carries this theme. One guy yawns, and another guy sees him, and so on and so forth until someone giving a public adress begins yawning and then people who are watching it begin yawning. The commercial is brought to and end when the pepsi product is drank by people and the yawning is stopped. "Wake up people" is the motto that is designed to show that this pepsi product will wake you up, hence the "wake up" part.

Photo Essays

Just recently, Mr. Ayers has given us a link to check out something he refers to as "photo essays". These are not much different that a timed slideshow, or even a movie in some cases. Basically, what it is, is a slide show of pictures that is accompanied by a commentary by the author. This can be to the author's advantage, as he can show whatever pictures he wants the "viewer" to see. He can also implement pauses and breaks at his pleasure. Not only that, but he has the right to emphasize words that he feels stand out and make an impact on the viewer.

We have a similar assignment to this in which we have to either make a slide show (similar to this one), or a movie, and one more option that i just cant think of right now. Anyways, me and my partner decided to do a movie. It seems simple enough. All we have to do is write the script/essay and make a movie that fits coherently with it. We also have the same rights as the people who make the slideshows, such as breaks and emphasis. In addition to this, we can also do special effects to the film. This shouldnt be too hard since we have the programming and experince needed to do it.