Incoherent Thoughts

It is almost summer and this blog is coming to a close. It was made for the sole purpose of schoolwork, and with summer just around the corner there isn’t much point to keep on posting. I was unable to think of an adequate topic, so here are some very incoherent thoughts that I have been having.

1. Summer is what all students dream of, from the point that it ends. There’s no school and you can do almost whatever you want. In the morning you get to sleep in and know that there is nothing to do. In the afternoon the sun shines radiant heat, which can easily send you napping. In the evening it starts to cool, and you’re proud to of accomplished nothing. At night you go to bed with an amazing feeling that seems like it will never end.

2. Food is awesome. Tastes and flavors rush out into your mouth as you chew it. And if you put two tastes together it creates a whole new flavor. French fries and ice cream for example. The fries a crispy, salty, and warm. Ice cream is soft, sweet, and cold. These clashing qualities actually make something together that is truly delicious.

3. Stars shine through the night without ever changing. It’s very hard to imagine that they’re actually just like the sun, except even bigger. And yet they’re so far away they look like tiny white dots that are only visible at night. When there is no light to reflect off of the air in our atmosphere, it becomes see-through and lets the stars shine through.

4. Life will find a way, it always does. When you look out at the universe it’s hard to imagine life existing somewhere else. But when you look at the actual chances, there is most certainly intelligent life out there. We only know what we experience, so logically it is impossible for us to imagine some other being’s life. It is haunting to think about someone else way up there, who’s wondering if you’re there, but then realizes that you are, and you’re thinking the exact same thing.

So maybe this summer I’ll just relax and realize something. I realize that nothing is a coincidence and that everything is connected. During the summer I may just sit by the fire. I may eat some french fries dipped in ice cream. I just might just happen to look up at the stars. And with all this I may share that perfect moment. So as you can see, nothing is truly unconnected, or incoherent.

Have a marvelous summer, ~ Tristan

P.S. I commented on Wyatt's Blog

SCIENCE FICTION

We know exactly what has happened in the past, and sort of what is happening now. But one thing we are unable to know is what is going to happen in the future. And I’m talking about spaceships, robots, and other advanced technology. Because of all the science fiction shows on T.V. we have a very fixed idea about what space life will be like. But upon having a full day to think about this, I realized that space life will not be anything like it is on T.V.

            The first issue is getting across huge distances in a few seconds. It has now been proven that it is impossible for humans to travel over the speed of light. This is because hydrogen gas would be forced into a high intensity radiation beam that would kill all affected life forms in a matter of seconds (so much for Star Trek). And even if you were to travel close to the speed of light, it would take too long to get up to speed without killer “Gs” – gravitational force. There is another form of space travel that is widely used in fiction, and that is warping technology. Warping technology basically consists of taking the ship it’s on out of existence, and in again somewhere else. This hasn’t been proven impossible, but if it is possible it will take centuries to develop. Overall the transportation needs for spaceships would require you to spend many years waiting to get to your destination.

            By the time we humans have reliable spaceships, there will probably be many more countries than there are now. And the chances are that there will be wars between some of them. That leads us to my next point. In science fiction you always see epic space battles going on. The weaponry consists of plasma related projectiles and missiles. Plasma weaponry, on a large enough scale for a ship, isn’t invented but it is quite possible for it to be invented in the next 50-100 years. As for missiles, they’re only going to get bigger. On the battle side of things, a space ship could easily engage in space-combat many years from now.

            Another thing that you often see on T.V. is alien life forms. Mathematical formulas have proven that there is intelligent life somewhere out there. The problem is that coming across them, or finding something they left behind is like finding a needle in a haystack bigger than our sun. And if we were to come across them, it would be survival of the fittest. Although we would be able to profit off of each other’s technology and knowledge, the governments would order to destroy anything that is a threat. Or perhaps it’ll be their side where the hostility originates. Either way it won’t be fun for us. Also, if we are friendly to each other, what are the chances of having the same understandings of the way things work. The concept of aliens has a major impact on our thoughts of the future, but whatever you think will happen, it is very unlikely.

            T.V. is completely changing our thoughts of what space life will be like. There won’t be any “hyperdrives” that take you past the speed of light; it will be quite a long boring ride. And if there are any space battles they’ll probably be pretty cool to watch from a distance, but not exactly what’s seen on T.V. Finally, if we ever do meet aliens, there is a high probability of hostility. I don’t think any of us can truly predict what space will be like when we travel through its great expanses, but I only hope that there is a hint of 21^st century imagination in there some where.

I commented on wills blog

Cause & Effect

Do you ever wonder what your life would be like if you had made one choice differently? Perhaps instead of taking a job in an office, you chose something that keeps you outside. But what would have happened if you were in the office? Maybe you make some new friends, one of which has a very tough life. Then one day when they break down, you give them simple advice that makes it all better. The person’s sudden realization of the way things should be, tells their child. And as he grows up, the inspiration from his parent drives him to make the world a better place. Although this may sound absurd, or at least unlikely, it could have happened. But because you never chose the office job, it never did, nor would you know if that’s exactly how it would happen. This is one example of a mind-boggling concept.

Such little things in our lives can make a big difference. Let’s say you’re in a hurry to get somewhere, so you don’t let a car turn in front of you, instead you make them wait. That little delay in the other driver’s time could have any number of results that would change their day, or maybe their whole life.  Pretend they continue on their path after you’re gone, and the cars right in front of them crash into each other. The driver swerves out of the way just in time, but what if you hadn’t cut them off and they were a little further up the road? This also may be extreme, but it could also happen. In this case you did something rude to someone, and something good came to him or her. More often than not, if you do something rude to someone, they will probably do something rude to someone else, until it causes something bigger to happen.

When I was in grade one, my teacher told me a story. On her morning run to the drive through at Tim Horton’s, the old man in front of her asked to pay for her. When she was pulled up to the window, the cashier said that the man in front paid for her coffee. The cashier also said that this had been going on constantly for an hour. So of course, my teacher paid for the people behind her, and the cycle continued. This is an example of something good contributing to more kindness.

Craig Kielburger was inspired in his childhood to make a difference. It was all because a boy had been killed after he escaped from child labor and tried to make a difference. Because the boy had been killed for someone’s convenience, Craig set out to prevent such things from happening. Just think if this had happened to someone with a different kind of personality. All of the lives saved, and work that Craig contributed to wouldn’t have happened. And all the people who he inspired wouldn’t have done their part in making this world a better place.

So now as you go about your day, keep this in mind. Be kind to people. Help someone who needs it. And never let anybody harm another person. Although something good can come out of something bad, so much more can be possible from kindness. For every good act you do, it goes on to other people who do the same thing. If it goes on enough, then it will change the world, and wouldn’t you want to be part of such a revolution to a better world?

P.S. As part of this blog assignment, I must comment on one of my classmate’s blog. So I choose to comment on Emily Moon’s blog.

Xbox failure

Technology is so important these days that you can’t live without it. Just last Saturday my Xbox broke and I’ve been struggling with what to do. I know I have work to do and many other games to play but knowing that one option isn’t available messes the whole day up. Only now have I found time to actually write this. This is a huge inconvenience that I wish to tell you about.

It started in the morning and it was working perfectly. I was playing the last level on Halo 3 on the hardest difficulty. I decided to call my gaming friend because I wanted to play co-op, but he wasn’t available that day. I go back to my Xbox and it won’t turn on, and it had the red ring of death (as oppose to the blue screen of death). And after much research it said that it had an internal hardware failure. My friend had said that he could play tomorrow so in the morning of the next day I got one, one that was much better then the previous Xbox. But because my family was watching hockey, I wasn’t able to set it up. OY!

I know that I’m very lucky to even have an Xbox, but when I’m used to having it and it breaks, it has a serious effect on my day. It’s sort of like this for a lot of people. Have you ever been working and your Internet didn’t work? And because you need it, you start freaking out? Well it’s a bad habit in this modern age. We should try not to let this happen, so please join me in being less reliant on technology. We are very lucky to have technology and we shouldn’t be this reliant on it.

P.S. I commented on wyatt's blog

Ozy & Millie

Imagine yourself on the first day at a new school. You’re only ten years old, and you’re worried. Will you fit in? Will you make friends? And there are bound to be bullies to watch out for. You know, those mean kids who push you around and make fun of you for no apparent reason. And you just know when they make fun of you they’ll use one of those cheesy rhymes with your name. Uh-oh, here come the first.

“Ozymandias, Ozymandias, he’s a big, a big, uhhh…”

Well at least you’re lucky if you have a name that doesn’t rhyme with anything.

(Due to sizing isues, if you want to see the full picture, click on it)

This is the opening of my favorite web comic: Ozy & Millie created by D.C. Simpson. Obviously from the title, the two main characters are Ozy and Millie. Ozy is a 10-year-old arctic fox who was named by the author because of the poem “Ozymandias” by Percy Bysshe Shelley. He is always wearing a top hat, and a vest, but no pants, which makes him immune to “pantsing” from the schoolyard bully, but a target for Millie’s jokes. He often ignores Millie’s pranks on people by using his philosophy of Zen, making him very serene.

Millie is a red-fox girl of the same age who can be quite a maniac. She and Ozy are best friends despite some controversies. Very unlike Ozy, Millie always gets into trouble, whether by trying to avoid work, or by scheming. She also has some odd creations, such as the George Bush sock puppet, used to make fun of everything he does. Regardless of her personality, Millie does have philosophical moments, probably due to being around Ozy.

The comic often deals with varying issues, such as politics, trends and advertising, and popularity. The first issue is politics. As mentioned before, Millie finds a way to criticize the government in a very humorous way. Second are trends. There is an secondary character in the comic named Avery who is obsessed with keeping up to date with all of the modern trends. Trends and advertising are made fun of to the extremes through Avery. The third thing the comic often makes fun of is popularity. The secondary character Felicia is a typical schoolgirl whose life revolves around popularity. These along with many other recent happenings are expressed comically in this comic.

The comic Ozy & Millie is possibly the best web comic strip ever. Its many characters give different perspectives on life and happenings. The very funny takes on certain issues also give the reader something to laugh at. Above all, the actual drawings are extremely well done. Ozy & Millie is an amazing comic, and you should give some of it a read.

P.S. I commented on Andrew's blog

Grease

I’m not the kind of person who likes to see plays and musicals, but just last weekend I saw a truly exceptional musical. I was with the Upper School choir on the CISMF trip, and on one of the nights we went to see a major production. It is called Grease, and it’s full of music, dancing, and a great story. Of the very few shows that I have seen, this is definitely the best.

Some of the amazing elements of the musical include, the great songs, astonishing actors, a famous country singer, big, grand sets, and a fluid plot. Some of my favorite songs of the musical are: Summer Nights, Greased Lightnin’, and We Go Together. The actors who perform these songs are brilliant; like Ace Young and Emily Padgett. Another famous name is Taylor Hicks who performed many old-fashioned country songs. For one of his songs he appeared out of a giant ice-cream cone that seemed to be solid. All of these elements came together for an amazing performance.

With each and every song, you wanted to get up and dance. The singers sung perfectly without any noticeable mistake. And the orchestra played the 50’s music very well too. The choreography for the singers was pretty cool; after a couple seconds of seeing them, it felt like you could do it too. The whole thing came together to be a truly remarkable performance.

P.S. I commented on emily M's blog

HTTYD

HTTYD

Mild Spoiler Warning

How To Train Your Dragon is an amazing movie. The story follows Hiccup, a weak, scrawny Viking, who is unable to fit in due to the fact that he can’t kill dragons. During one attack by the dragons on the town, Hiccup manages to take down the most rare and dangerous dragon called a Night Fury. Nobody sees the dragon fall past a ridge or Hiccup actually hitting it. Because no one believes that he took down a Night Fury he sets out to find the dragon and kill it. Once he finds it he decides not to kill the dragon, but to let it loose. After a couple of visits to the injured Night Fury Hiccup befriends the dragon. With time on his hands and craftsman skills, he makes a harness so he can ride his newfound friend.

            Toothless is the name given to the Night Fury by Hiccup because when he first saw the dragon he didn’t have teeth. After the first encounter though, Toothless is much more like a pet then a dreaded Night Fury, but he does show aggression whenever Hiccup is in danger or threatened. Because Toothless is injured, Hiccup makes an artificial tail wing to replace Toothless’ missing one, which Hiccup has to control when flying. So when Toothless and Hiccup fly together they appear to be in perfect harmony. Another odd thing about Toothless is; he has an uncanny resemblance to Stitch from Lelo & Stitch.

            The animation in this movie is really something to admire. For some of the scenes that take place in the air, it all seems so majestic with detail of the land below. The fire from the dragon’s mouths is also something that is very difficult to make realistic. And overall, the people look so real, and because they’re Vikings, it adds a very specific, and good, feel to it all. All in all How To Train Your Dragon is a must see movie that has stunning animation and a very good plot.

P.S. I commented on will's blog

Animal books are awesome. Anything book with talking animals will immediately be accepted onto my bookshelf. Aside from Harry Potter and other books like that, animal related books are the only kind I’ll read. Some of my favorites of this “furry” genre are: Redwall, Silverwing, and Warriors. Every summer when I’m at my cottage I always read and reread all of these books as I can.

There is one book that I have been holding out on for a reason, and that is Watership Down. I purchased Watership Down a while back but my sister, who was in grade 8 a while back, that I would be reading it for LA, told me. I’ve heard many good things about it from my parents, and I’m eager to read it. Now I’ve been told that we aren’t going to read it in term 3. Although I could read it on my own time, I would love to be able to read it for school. And now with our teacher asking us what we might want to add to the term 3 curriculum, this is the perfect time to bring up this argument.

Watership Down hasn’t been read by the grade 8s in a while but I think it is a very good book to bring back. One of the reasons it’s so great is that it’s about rabbits; how many books can you think of that are like that? Another thing is that Watership Down is a very known book, and gets a lot of praise. Finally the book is one that can provide a lot of work (not that I want work) for our teacher to give us. I think that reading Watership Down for class in term 3 would be great for us students and our teacher.

P.S. I commented on Andrew's blog

My blog

Please excuse my run on sentences, I feel it helps get the point across.

If you read this blog regularly (thank you if you are) then you have noticed that I publish a new post weekly. Well I have a problem with that! Having to write three paragraphs to the best of my ability each week is exhausting my writing. Writing is not something that can be pushed, it needs to come when you get inspiration. And when you have a busy life, inspiration comes more rarely and over all it is harder to write for a blog.

There are many influences in my life that really don’t help doing what I am doing right now. First is other school work, there are so many projects, and plain old work that when the time comes around to write a blog, you just don’t feel like anything good can come out of your pulsing head. Second is my social life, although I may not have much of a social life there is still enough chaos to give me a headache, but then I wonder what it’s like for other people. Third is my other writing, I am writing a book (which you will know if you read some of my previous entries) and I haven’t written a word in it for many weeks because my writing is going toward my blog (that’s not good).  All of these combined with the fact that my teacher marking this right now marks these blogs heavily really gets me out of the mood for getting my computer out and typing about a pointless topic.

Writing should be fun and enjoyable, but blogs aren’t. I realize that you, ***oh teacher***, have tricked almost our whole class into writing these blogs instead of writing journal entries, or short essays which are exactly the same. Now with this busy time of the year we are all very busy, (especially because of science fair) I ask that you lighten the load. ***It is but a dream to only do a blog entry once a month***(add a Shakespearean accent to those last star surrounded parts) but if that isn’t enough, then perhaps one every other week. And another thing, you have to mark every blog that’s written, so you have a lot of work out of our work. And lastly, in the one in seven billion chance that I have a fan of my blog, I apologize for scaring you with this information.

***Tristan*** =D

WATCHMEN (SPOILER WARNING)

There are only a few comic books that really make you think. Most of the time comic books have pointless superheroes fighting egomaniacal villains. Although Watchmen does have these elements, there is a huge amount of material that makes you ponder the way things are. Watchmen isn’t just a another comic book, it gets rid of the border between right and wrong, it gives a glimpse into an alternate reality, and it shows true human nature. Even though it is dark it’s possibly the greatest comic book ever made.


The book starts in 1985 with the murder of “The Comedian” who isn’t exactly a typical comedian (an assassin of sorts). After a failed police investigation, Rorschach (a costumed hero) does his own investigation in The Comedians apartment. It appears to Rorschach that there is a masked killer going after retired costumed heroes. Rorschach continues his investigation to find out who killed The Comedian while many other small side stories happen to reveal characters and an impending nuclear doom. When it all comes down to it, it turns out that it’s one of their own with a plot to prevent a war that could end the world but also kill millions of people. He had killed The Comedian because he figured it out. His plan was to use teleportation technology and a mutated creature to make it appear as in an alien tried to attack the world but failed. When other countries hear about this happening to the U.S.A. they stop fighting and offer help. In the long run the plan saved many lives but it also took many as well. It brings the ongoing question of what is right and what is wrong.


For every chapter there is a quote and some dense background info. The quotes always reflect on the events of the chapter. Some of them are from very famous people or places, such as Bob Dylan. The background info between each chapter contains information about character’s pasts, or other relavent information. Watchmen does contain adult...stuff, so reader discretion is advised for those who want to read it. All in all because of some very philosophical things, Watchmen is one of the best comic books ever made.

~Tristan J.R.M.~

Furry Fandom


Do you enjoy reading those newspaper comics about talking animals? Or find yourself staring at dog bobble heads? If any of these are true, or if you just have a liking for animals, you may be a “furry”. A furry is someone who likes anthropomorphic animals (animals with human traits). There is a huge world of furries on the internet, some good, and unfortunately, some bad. I will talk to you about some of the better stuff.

There are so many things involved in furry fandom. One such thing is artwork, out on the internet there are people who devote all of their skill to drawing Anthropomorphic animals, from web comics to full blown masterpieces. Many art sites feature an “Anthro” section, while some are dedicated to only furry art. There is also a lot of literature made in this genre. For example, Roar is a collection of short anthropomorphic stories. Once you see how much is out there, you realize that furry fandom is huge.

I really enjoy surfing around good furry sites on the internet. There is one web comic called Faux Pas (pronounced Fox Paws) which I absolutely love. There are also some great works of art on Deviant Art that I like to browse. I also enjoy watching fandubs on youtube, these are videos from animated movies, or stuff like that, with different voices added on top. All in all furry fandom is a very big part in my life.

Athos


Who knows what goes through a 9 year olds head.

During the summer when I was 9, I was very bored. To keep myself amused I would sit out on our deck in the warm sun with a pencil and a piece of paper. On that piece of paper something amazing happened. I poured out the extent of my imagination onto the white sheet. What came out of it was Athos.

Athos is an imaginary world that I made up. On it are islands, oceans, and every kind of landform you can imagine. I also made plants and animals that inhabit the whole planet; from fish and sea monsters in the ocean to canines and felines on the land. One type of animal I made is the liber, which is basically a liger. Another thing is the culture; most of the animals are nomadic and they all speak the same language. I made this language at the same time as everything else but due to some improvements I am making on it, I’m still working on that part. I had everything I could think of, down on paper.

Over the years I added island chains, continents, cave networks, and new rivers. It was quite cool how I made so much. Soon I sort of left it for a year then I heard about NaNoWriMo(which I have mentioned in a previous blog post). It was the perfect opportunity to continue Athos. And thus my book was born.

Right now my book is 20069 words long and counting. It’s full of everything; excitement, suspense, mystery, and a few philosophical moments too. I work on it whenever I get the chance, but it is still going slowly. When I can, I like to write at the bookshelf cafe. Being there really helps the speed and quality of my writing. With any luck one day it will be published and Athos will become a series of books, and maybe a bestselling series. It all came to me when I was 9 and it all evolved from there, and hopefully it will go much farther than it is now.

15 years ago the best TV station was first aired. The Discovery Channel was started in Canada and now reaches out to 170 countries on 29 network brands in 33 languages. It features amazing shows such as Mythbusters, Daily Planet, and Cash Cab just to name a few. Discovery Channel also offers HD shows, some of them include; Brainiac: Science Abuse, Time Warp, and Austen Steven’s Adventures. Because of the amount of awesome shows, and knowledge delivered to viewers, Discovery Channel is my favourite channel of all time.

Through the years D.C. has gone through many changes; from programming to looks, to advertising. For example, in the beginning, D.C.’s logo consisted of its name and a sphere in white with a black background. Now the logo is 3D and contains a detailed earth, which to be honest isn’t much different. Another thing, the shows that appeared ten or years ago were much different. You can imagine the old fashioned documentaries. Nowadays there are more in depth and exiting science shows (Brainiac Science Abuse especially).

All in all Discovery Channel is just plain awesome in every way possible. But the one thing that I would really like to point out before I finish is why D.C. is closely related to the meaning of life. If you are reading this blog you will probably notice the big “42” above this post. Well, Douglas Adams wrote in his book that the meaning of life is 42. I’m a big fan of this book and D.C. was channel 42 on our TV, coincidence, I think not!

There are thousands upon thousands of movies out there and even more books. The chances are that somewhere among all that entertainment, there are bound to be repeats. Eragon, for example, was an amazing book, but the movie was absolutely horrible. The plot was different and there wasn’t enough action. Harry Potter was another one, I guess it was unavoidable but there wasn’t enough of the original story; they left so many things out. Yet it still is enjoyable to watch. There are many examples of this but I do find a problem with it all.


Books leave most of the story to the imagination. Movies take that mental aspect away, but they can still provide entertaining visuals. Modern CGI is just getting better and better, so for some books it helps them to be turned into movies. Another issue is length; books can be as long as the author wants, whereas movies are almost always less than 3 hours. Given less time in a movie for character development can really change the way characters are understood by the viewers. In other terms, unless the movie adaption is really well done, it isn’t very good in my opinion.

Most of the time, movie adaptions don’t live up to their full potential. Many producers beg authors for the rights to make a movie; the book writer should take extreme discretion when making the decision. Although movies made from books aren’t always that good, they can still be entertaining... enough.

Technology is progressing at an incredible rate; “by 2013 there will be a supercomputer that will be able to do more computing than a human brain”. The question that I have next would be: if there will be a computer capable of doing more than a human brain, does that mean that in the future we could download our thoughts into a computer? Just think how cool that would be, and the possibilities it would bring. Our consciousness could go on forever. And if there was an interface which let video cameras be connected, we would be able to see. It’s all very strange when you think about it but on the other hand, one day it will be reality.

Like previously stated, technology is at a “boom”. First, the internet is expanding at an exponential rate. There are over 200 million users on MySpace, if that were its own country it would be the fifth largest in he world. Second is the raw technological information. Japan has developed a fibre optic cable that can push 14 trillion bits down a single fibre optic cable every second, and when you consider that there can be many more fibre optics in a single undersea cable, it makes you wonder how much information is out there. And finally is discovery. There are university students learning how to do jobs that don’t exist, with technology that doesn’t exist, to solve problems that aren’t problems yet! If we are able to solve all of the problems in the world (hunger for example) and we get every single human being focusing on our technological evolution there is no doubt that one day we will be capable of doing almost anything.


Facts from the video "Did You Know"

NaNoWriMo

NaNoWriMo: National Novel Writing Month. As I write this, it’s November and I am participating in NaNoWriMo. This means that I have to write a novel in one month. That may seem like too much of a task over school and other time consuming activities, but it is very doable. And I am not the only one doing it; just last year there were 119301 adult participants. 18.2 percent of which won (that’s 21683 people!) Everybody who participated tried to write 50000 words, all in the 30 day month of November. Together, all those people wrote a total of 1.6 billion words (that’s enough to go around the moon many times.) I quite enjoy it, and I think that many other people would too.


But that is just the adults. This year there are over 1000 classrooms participating in NaNoWriMo’s Young Writers Program. The Y.W.P. is for children who have very little likely hood of reaching 50000 words. It lets them choose their word count goal, according to grade. This is what I am doing, not the full NaNoWriMo, and I need to reach 15000 words by November 30th. With Y.W.P. children get a chance to express their imagination in a very productive way. Both Y.W.P. and NaNoWriMo are great ways to test your imagination and endurance. I think that the next time November comes around you should try one of these word marathons.

On October 26th, I listened the best speech I have ever heard. In my humble opinion, Barack Obama is rivalled by Eva Olsson when it comes to speeches. She is a Holocaust survivor and her message is one that most people turn away from, one that they don’t want to hear. She went through something we can barely begin to imagine, and for that I think we should at the very least listen to what Eva has to say. Her message is not just one thing it’s many messages, such as bullying, hate, and even driving under the influence, all in one story.


Within her story there are many messages: Hate, something we say or feel without even realizing it, but it is hate, which led people to do such bad things. She said it is okay to dislike something but not to hate. Family, Eva’s biggest memory is of seeing her mother taken away from her and never being able to say “I love you,” to her again. Eva told us to say that to our parents because in this world you never know how long you might have to say it to them. Bullies and bystanders, if you hurt you are a bully, and if you watch this you are a bystander. Being a bystander is just as bad as bullying. Drunk driving, just so you know, DRUNK DRIVING IS BAD! Never give up, Eva couldn’t live a day at a time because it was too much, instead she lived a minute at time. In doing this, she never gave up. All of the messages Eva told us about, need to be remembered for generations to come.

Norval

On October 19, 2009 our middle school went to Norval for a team building day.

After a long drive thanks to traffic, we arrived at the colourful forest entrance. We then split into our different grades and played games that had to do with team building. The first was the Inuit blanket toss: where we would toss someone into the air and catch them using a big, reinforced tarp. For the second, we divided our grade in half and went either into the forest or out into the clearing. My team went to the high ropes course to do “Mission Impossible” where one of us wore a harness attached to four ropes and the rest of us would pull on those ropes to move that person around, without touching the ground. Finally, we had to climb a 14 foot wall with only the help of our peers. That was our day in a nutshell, but that was just what happened. What happened as a team is much different.

Being a team is very important; if we don’t work together things can go bad. For the Inuit blanket toss we all did pretty well except for a few minor lapses, such as not pulling the tarp out at the same time. In “Mission Impossible” it went very well except for when Emilie was in the harness. She went as high as the rig could go because two of the four sides pulled as hard as they could without telling everybody else. When we got to the wall, we were tired but we did try very hard. Greg and I did most of the lifting of other people, until they were over the top of the wall. The people at the top had to help pull them up, and because there was a lapse of communication only one person fell. Don’t worry that person was caught! (Somewhat) I think overall we did pretty well as a team except for communication between us.

Norval taught me that there are two sides to team building activities: the physical and the mental. The physical side is fairly easy; if I have to pull on a rope, then I pull on a rope, no big deal. The mental side is the risk taking, communicating, and trusting your peers. Personally, I found trust and communication to be the hardest part of being on a team. So now if I do another team building activity, I will know what I have to work on.

Tiny Wonders

At this time of year, the leaves always fall to the ground. It gives the ground wondrous colours of scarlet, amber, and citrus. Some of the leaves land on grass, or rocks, but some fall into water. Sometimes that water is shallow and doesn’t move, and you can see straight to the very bottom. If the leaves sink, the colour fades, but somehow they’re still magnificently littering their colours to the lakebed.

All it takes is one tiny stone to be thrown into the pond, and everything changes. The one stone causes waves to spread out from the epicentre, distorting the beautiful scene underneath. Witnessing this event, I found myself at a loss for words despite the simplicity of the situation. After pondering it all for while, I realized that you can look at it two ways: all it takes is something very small to ruin a great picture, or alternatively, one little object can open your eyes to what is actually happening. Small wonders can sometimes be the biggest.

Rock, Paper, Scissors and Tai Chi

“Softness conquers hardness” Principle of Tai Chi

This quote may seem bizarre when you first hear it, but it makes a lot of sense. Say you’re in a conflict; trying to resolve it with words (the soft approach) rather than fighting (the hard approach) works better to solve the problem. In fact, just recently Barak Obama won the Nobel peace prize for getting countries at war to talk to each other instead of just shooting at one another. Even though almost everyone has been told that talking things out works best (to a point that is almost annoying) it really is the best. Keeping all of this in mind can really help you if trouble does arise.

Personally, when I hear this quote I think of Rock, Paper, Scissors. The soft, flimsy paper beats the sheer, hard might of rock every time. Something else that pops into my mind is the idiom “You’ll catch more flies with honey, than with vinegar.” I always find there is a hidden meaning to many sayings; like in the one right above, it’s not just a tip for catching flies, but a way to be a better person. The quote at the top is a bit more direct but I still believe there is a deeper meaning, can you figure it out?