My Last Blog

How sad. I personally liked using the blogging system opposed to a journal. I never had a journal in school so I guess I would probably like anything besides that. I would like to say it's been an interesting journey through blogger and it will be missed, but I have all the memories to keep me going. Ok I'm being a little sarcastic but I'm serious about it being more effective than any other form of jounal. Goodbye blog.

Effectiveness of Workshops

I think these workshops were effective because I like to get feedback from different people. I think the feedback I got so far is really good so I'm looking forward to hearing about my RBAA.

This Weekend

Sucked. It was a constant headache and I felt like my head was spinning all day. No I wasn't drunk. My mother in law and my brother both flew in on Friday from Seattle. My brother flew in Friday morning in Sioux City, Iowa and we had to go to Sioux Falls, SD to pick my mother in law up that night. My brother stayed with my dad because my place was full. Let me give you a example of how the nights went: loud baby, loud house guest, loud arguing, and of course dinners with the whole family thats down here in this terrible place we call Vermillion. We had to run a lot of errands and my dad is the only one with the car so we had to work everything out and that was a headache itself. We dropped my brother off yesterday afternoon at the airport after we went to see my grandma in Iowa so I was on the road all day. Then when I got back the whole loud process started over for one more night and of course more arguing. My mother in law left this morning at 11am and now its back to normal I guess. Whatever that is.

Outline

I liked the concept of the outlines we worked on in class. After completing it I basically have my paper done I just have to add a few things. I think we should have this for every paper it really helps out.

Updated Thesis

Ursula Le Guin's "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" represent how selish people can be in this world and also how very few people choose not to be in that category of selfishness by walking away.

Thesis

Ursula Le Guin's "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" represents how selfish people are and for the ones who actually walked away represent the very few people in the world that refuse to be apart of such selfishness.

Reading Critically

This is the first time I actually went through a story and tried to find symbols or anything else that I thought had meaning. It's definitely time consuming but overall I think I did ok.

Symbols In "A White Heron" and "The Yellow Wall-Paper"

For "A White Heron" I just picked the symbols we did in class: cow, milk, gun, white. I'm not exactly sure what most of these mean, I'm not too good with symbolism. For "The Yellow Wall-Paper" I picked: haunted house, yellow, wall-paper. Like before I'm not exactly sure how to spot out these symbols or what they mean. I'm hoping thursday's class will help me better understand this topic.

Woman In The 1900's

The 1900's were big for women sports (CQ Researcher), it was the first time women competed in the olympics (CQ Resarcher), it was the rise of civil rights activism and feminsm sparking a power struggle in sports (CQ Researcher), it was the lauching of the first women's profesional sports leagues (CQ Researcher), and the impact of the Civil Rights Restoration Act on sports for women (CQ Researcher).

CQ Researcher; 5/11/2001, Vol. 11 Issue 18, P. 411, 1p

Short Stories

The Collected Writings of Ambrose Bierce was a very interesting story to me. The author did a great job playing it out like a movie for me. I can picture perfectly how everything happened and it had me anxious to read what was coming next. Towards the end I was thinking he made a great escape from death and how much courage he had just to get back to his wife and home. But all that was his vision before his body was left hanging from the bridge. This was one of my favorites from all of the reading assignments this semester.

The Most Dangerous Game was a great story. The General was a sick man who got off by hunting humans but the hunted, Rainsford, he was very skilled and determined to survive. I liked the story but at the end I was a little confused. I wonder why Rainsford didn’t kill the General right then and there. I figured he was fed to the hounds but why would his own hounds kill him? I must have missed something but I still think it was a good story.

The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas

This short story was a little disturbing to me. At first I thought it was just some hippies in a weird little world, but then I kept reading. It made me think about how selfish people can be. I thought that even though it sounds, looks, and feels cruel most people in the world would let that one life suffer for their happiness. For the people who walked away from Omelas those people represent the very few in this world that actually care, maybe not enough to do something about it but they care enough that they don't want to be around it. This short story is just a little reminder about how cold this world is and how much people just don't care. Something might get to somebody enough to piss them off or make them sad but they don't care enough to do something about it. That's reality.

RBAA

This paper was a little hard to get started but once I did it started to flow. My topic is Harsher Punishment for Police Brutality and Excessive Force and I actually enjoyed researching about this topic and finding out statistics instead of just going off of street knowledge and opinions. This is my first research paper so I hope it turns out ok for now, I know I have two more drafts ahead of me.

This Semester So Far

So far so good, I definitely picked up some skills in English. I'm not completely lost like I was at the beginning of the semester. I've been passing all my exams in my other classes and the only class I don't like is Math because it's supposed to be self taught at your own pace but they want you to be on a certain chapter by a certain week. It's ridiculous I want a teacher teaching me a class that I'm paying for. But other than that overall I think this semester is going well.

Topic

The topic I decided on is "Harsher Punishment for Police Brutality and Excessive Force." I chose this topic because it's a serious issue and it seems like nobody, besides the people getting beat up by the cops, care. If a cop shoots someone in the back of the head while their running away from them you would expect a harsh punishment right? Wrong, they get a paid suspension while the case is "investigated." They might get a lawsuit against the department but they make something up to cover their ass. I can't wait to further research this topic, I think I'll actually enjoy writing this paper.

Next Paper Topic

Ok so I'm watching the today show and they're showing something about flight attendants giving the safety presentation for the flight by dancing to a lady gaga song. No relevance at all I just think that's hilarious. I don't think anything on my list is worth writing about. The only category I really filled out was "what I don't like about South Dakota" and even though that can be discussed for hours I don't think a research paper can have that topic. Hopefully I'll have a topic by thursday, I'm not too excited about this paper.

Presentations

Well today was interesting. I wasn't too prepared for the presentation but hopefully the info I came with was useful. I thought the handouts were very helpful and I learned some new things I can definitely add in my writing.

Not Exactly Sure

I'm not exactly sure what I'm supposed to be blogging about so I'll just wing it. This week has been a little stressful because I'm still getting used to having this workload on top of my family life. But at the same time I try to pay no mind to this stress because it's good to finally have some structure back in my life. I love that my day is a set schedule now and I'm always busy. I'm not a lazy person but my mind was elsewhere and focused on all the wrong things before coming down here to South Dakota. I can say now that I am a changed man and I have a very positive attitude towards school and life in general. I can't wait to see where I end up after graduating.

Thesis

My proposal essay topic is gang violence. This paper is inspired by the death of a friend who unfortunately was taken from us by this violence. Rest In Paradise Justin Cunningham A.K.A Juice, you will never be forgotten. My thesis for my proposal essay is " Gang violence comes from protection of that gang's territory, but the root of it is the money that comes with the lifestyle and is influenced heavily by alcohol and drugs. Therefore the focus needs to be on the drug problem and keeping the youth busy and making them feel like they have a belonging in society."

100 People Who Are Screwing Up America

I agree with the author Bernard Goldberg to a point. These so called "America bashers" are only one sided and opinionated but in a way so is the author. But for the most part I agree with Bernard Goldberg, I have some of the same opinions as he does about America bashers and the war in Iraq especially about Abu Ghraib. The My Lai massacre is nothing compared to the treatment and interrogation tactics we used at Abu Ghraib. People don't understand that these prisoners were prisoners of war and were not held in American prisons, so of course there not going to be treated like American prisoners. We did what we had to do to obtain information to save lives, yes we took it a little overboard at times but were not the people chopping heads off over the internet! I personally think the American public is too sensitive at times and ignorant. When 9/11 happened the whole country was ready to go to war but after some time, the same people who wanted to fight are demanding us to leave and saying we should've left a long time ago, some say we shouldn't have been there to begin with. I'm just saying, I agree with the author when he says, "The problem is that too many America bashers only criticize America." This subject could be blogged about for hours but I'll wrap it up, I enjoyed reading this and I think the author is a great writer and makes valid points. I wouldn't mind reading this book on my spare time. One more thing these Punitive Liberals are ridiculous how can you be a so called "expert" on this topic? Yes, are country has made mistakes in the past, we can't change that, but we have also evolved and we try to better ourselves. Stop living in the past and look to the future and have pride in our country that is all.

Peer Review

I liked how the peer review went today. I got some more ideas on expanding my paper and I really enjoyed reading Casey Clausen's paper. I'm keeping this short and sweet, I hope you enjoyed another blog by Cameron Holland.

If I Died Tomorrow

If I died tomorrow the world would not be different at all. Life will go on for everybody else with the exception of family. It's the same scenario as when I was incarcerated, I would be nothing but a statistic and soon forgotten if even noticed by the world. My family would be affected because they know who I am, they know I'm a good person and I wouldn't be judged.

English 101

I used to feel that I didn't need to take english, I felt forced and I wasn't going to get anything out of it. But now since I'm in college and actually wanting to be here, after doing a few assignments I realize theres alot of useful information also I realized my grammar and english speaking skills were horrible.

The Notebook

To me this guy is very deep. I liked his view on himself, for example when he said, "But do not be misled. I am nothing special; of this I am sure. I am a common man with common thoughts, and I've led a common life. There are no monuments dedicated to me and my name will soon be forgotten, but I've loved another with all my heart and soul, and to me, this has always been enough." I can relate to this because I'm also a simple man, I don't want or need much in my life and I'm thankful for everything that I do have.

Language Literacy

I chose to blog about this in class discussion because these short stories just didnt interest me that much, sorry. In Seattle you have to be very patient with all the different cultures. For example, if u decide you want to go to china town and grab a bite to eat but you can't find a specific restraunt, you ask somebody. If your not patient with that person that's struggling to get his or her words out in a foriegn language, even though it's english, your not going to be happy. Being half Korean I grew up in a Korean dominant neighborhood and area. Everybody around either spoke Korean or was from Korea so they had a tough time speaking english, so for everybody else patience was tested. I remember watching shows with my mom that were only in Korean but had english subtitles. It was interesting to me because I was basically teaching myself the language since my mom never bothered. To this day I still never learned the language but I understand how difficult it is for the person that can't fully understand the english language. I don't tolerate people that make rude comments about people that can't speak english well. I personally had the experience and it's really hard on both parties, so the lesson today is be patient and before you decide to be rude put ur self in that persons shoes.  

Autobiography

My name is Cameron Holland I'm 20 years old and I'm from Seattle, Washington. I never finished highschool due to troubles in and out of school but I didn't give up and I went ahead and got my GED. I have a fiance' and a 2 year old son that mean the world to me and they motivated me to change the life I was living and become a better man for both of them and myself. I've been on my own for awhile now and I was tired of struggling and tired of the stress that came with that. My father lives in South Dakota and offered me some help and a opportunity so I took it. I came out here to South Dakota to find a job and ended up enrolling at USD and before I even knew what was going on I was accepted. I never would've thought I would be in South Dakota looking for work and enrolling in USD, but I know now that was probably the best decision I've made in years.