Untitled

[jadams2886-blog]

Staples

“I beheld the wretch-the miserable monster I created” - Mary Shelley

Shelley's quote relates perfectly to Staples' essay. In Shelley's case Frankenstein is viewed by the people as a monster because he looks scary and is very intimidating and the town folk mistreat him. In Staples' essay the man is stereotyped as being involved with crime and mischief because he is black. The man tries to cope with this by whistling classical music and keeping his distance from other people so he won't be suspicious. 

[jadams2886-blog]

Political Power

“Political Power grows out of the barrel of a gun” -Mao Tse-Tung

I disagree with Mao's statement. Political power grows out of whoever puts in the most money. All politics revolve around money, the distribution of money, and the reservation of money. A country gains a military force by putting in a lot of money to train. Public projects does not have anything to do with intimidation or violence, but money. Of course, politics shouldn’t be run in such a manner, one should honestly aim for the common good, yet, money does not care for the common goods needs. Money is how the guns get there in the first place.

[jadams2886-blog]

Word: Southpaw 

Definition: a person who is left-handed

Etymology: originally a baseball slang for left-handed pitchers. Finley Peter Dunne, a Chicago sports journalist first used this word in 1885.

Importance: This word makes lefties stand out and make them have some kind of importance in baseball and in life.

[jadams2886-blog]

Work and Play

Usually there is a broad line between work and play. Work sucks most of the time and play is pretty enjoyable. This line can be blurred in the case of a professional athlete. Most athletes grew up loving the sports that they played. When they go pro, they automatically make around 300,000 dollars a year. I would go berserk if someone told me they would pay me that much money to do the thing that I loved more than anything. It is very hard work to become a professional athlete. You cannot get by with only talent. I am sure 99% of professional athletes would agree that the work is totally worth the pay and the excitement of playing the sport they love.

[jadams2886-blog]

Work and Play

“Work and play are words used to describe the same thing under differing conditions”

Mark Twain

I agree with this quote because for a lot of people work is fun for them. People like me like the feeling of accomplishing something after a long day of hard work, whether it be physically or mentally in school. Overall I would describe work and play as the same thing, but in play you can mess around and there is minimal guidelines. In work you have a certain criteria or quota to fulfill the job.

[jadams2886-blog]

Altruism

Definition: the principle or practice of unselfish concern for or devotion to the welfare of others.                                                                                                    

   I think there are very few instances where altruism exist. One things that sticks out to me is when love is involved. I feel a lot of people would give up their life to let their kids or spouse live instead of them if it was there only choice. Yet this barely happens, so altruism is very scarce.

  This relates to caring and sharing because the school wants to provide for needy people and are trying to get everyone involved. I think this is good, but also I know that most people aren't giving for being nice, they are giving to fit in with the rest of the school.

[jadams2886-blog]

Dwellings

A dwelling that I would like to live in would be the sky. I would love to be some kind of bird of prey like an eagle. It would be nice to be feared by others and have an awesome view wherever I would fly. I would like this because if I ever get bored of the scenery, I could go wherever I pleased within my climate limitations.

[jhoward95-blog]

Does the lobotomy really work? No. From the details in the autobiography, the relationship is still strained between the author and his stepmother. A relationship is two-sided. It requires both sides to be willing to admit if they are wrong. It is impossible for a child and parent to get along...

[jadams2886-blog]

It seems like the abstract family relations would work for this book. It seems like the relationship is a work in progress and it would be interesting to see how it works out. I feel relationships in families should always be very strong so I think someone will have to take a risk and try to make it work.

[ginafrancescal-blog]

Smashed #4

“I am deeply frustrated by the fact that all the Malibu I am sipping isn’t even having an effect on me.”

This quote is scary to me. Zaicklas drinks so much that it is just natural to her, it has no affect on her. This is the point where I would realize that I had a problem with alcohol, then again some the things she does under the influence would get me to stop. I think she needs to slowly stop instead of just going all out stopping if her problem is really this bad. 

[jadams2886-blog]

A good abstract would be change. I don't know if the character eventually gets out of her drinking problem, but it would probably change her life. I feel if you suddenly stop doing something that you have always done, something else would have to take its place. 

[stevenschaller]

Blog post 2

“Boras was famous for extracting more money than other agents for amateur players.  If the team didn’t pay whatever Boras asked, Boris would encourage his client to take a year off of baseball and reenter the draft the following year, when he might be selected by a team with real money.”  Michael Lewis talks about how the agent Boras was strictly focused on getting money for his players.  He didn’t care about their careers or how teams performed. He felt that money was the only objective.  

[jadams2886-blog]

It seems like society is being more selfish and greedy and all people think about is the money they will make. This is true for Boras because he has a bad reputation for scamming teams, but players probably love him. From a players point of view after a certain amount of years they probably don't care how they play because they are already guaranteed a large sum of money. This probably effects a lot of players performances down the road in their careers.

[bryaniglesiasschool]

One thing I really liked about this book was the way it was written. “Tracy” was written not in a standard paragraph form, but in a journal form.

I liked this because not only was it an easy enjoyable read, but the day by day information showed the deterioration of her addiction very effectively....

[jadams2886-blog]

It seems like it was easier to understand what was going on in the story because it was basically organized. I don't know if this is true, but a downside may be that it is more simple writing and low diction, so it may not have as much symbolic meaning or an abstract may be harder to write about.

[bryaniglesiasschool]

After reading this book I also thought about how growing up as an only child is different than growing up with siblings. I am an only child, and I can honestly say that I feel like i’ve missed out on certain experiences that would help me in life.

I guess I can’t say what they are, but I feel...

[jadams2886-blog]

I agree that having siblings gives you more experiences and can change your life. I think if you have siblings it is easy to always rely on them for being their for you in your life. If your an only child this isn't possible so the person may feel more obligated to make a lot of friends so it fills the void at home.

[jadams2886-blog]

Moneyball #5

In the end of the story Billy Beane's Athletics loses in the first round of the playoffs. He is emotionally crushed and doesn't know how to handle it. In the off season he is offered a contract from the Boston Red Sox that surpassed every other GM contract in pay. Billy verbally agreed to the contract. He then remembered that in his youth money blinded him. He remembered his vow to never make a decision based off of money. He ends up changing his mind and sticking with the A's. Billy continues his struggle with replacing star players and filling them in with scrubs to become superstars. Billy Beane will be known as one of the best GM's of all time. Throughout the book the main abstract shown is money and class in America because of the struggling teams due to lack of money.

[jadams2886-blog]

Moneyball #4

Another aspect of the struggling Oakland A's was the fact that players agents told their clients not to sign with Oakland because they would get payed very poorly. In the book an agent Boras told teams that other teams would be willing to pay double what the original offer was so his clients would get a good deal. This shows that people will do anything for money even if they have to lie about the situation and exaggerate what is really going on.

[jadams2886-blog]

Moneyball #3

Throughout the book, the Oakland A's organization emphasizes the need to get undervalued players. They need to replace players that leave to get payed more money. The A's do this by getting players who play the game unorthodox, or if they look funny. For example the baseball market overlooked the former catcher Chad Bradford. He was done playing catcher because of an injury, so every team thought he was useless. The A's realized that he got on base a lot and he could help the team out in the long run. At the end of the season Bradford ended up second in on base percentage and was the best hitter on the A's that season. This shows a rebuttal to the previous post because Bradford excelled at what he did and the rest of his team even thought they were working on a low budget.

[jadams2886-blog]

Moneyball #2

Billy Beane quits baseball and asks to be a scout for the Oakland A's. He eventually works his way up to being the General Manager, which pretty much oversees the whole organization. Year after year he struggles with putting an efficient team on the field with minimizing the amount of money spent. At the start of his GM career he hired a Harvard grad student who majored in economics. He made Billy realize that players were overvalued and undervalued. He calculated a formula in order to make the playoffs. They needed a certain amount of runs and a certain Earned Run Average. Offensively the two important stats were on base percentage and Slugging percentage. The Harvard grad essentially helped Billy put a solid team on the field year after year without being embarrassed, but they never won a championship. So far I see the abstract money and class in America being used. It seems like only money is the key to success in life. Whoever makes a lot of money will live without conflict.

[jadams2886-blog]

Analog Watch

A watch that represents time by the position of hands on a dial. Now there are digital watches.