Banned Books Presentation

Today, I went to the presentation about banned books. I had a talk with the professor and she informed me that common books that I read in high school like, The Giver, Huckleberry Finn and 1984 had been banned in other counties in Maryland. I was not aware of that this still took place today and especially so close to where I live. After reading those books I don’t think they had any negative effect on me. Even though there was racist stuff in Huckleberry Finn, reading the book did not make me racist. It is very easy to read a book that has controversial view points and take them for face value. Just because someone reads something in a book does not mean they will pick it up and it will become their own viewpoint. Later on a student read aloud a poem by Shell Silverstein that dealt with cannibalism. It seems very ridiculous to me that some narrow minded person would have that banned because they thought it would lead to people turning to cannibalism. That was basically the idea that I got from the whole talk I had with the professor and listening to the students talk.

Long Distrance Relationships

I have been dating a girl who goes to Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond for about three months now. We went to high school together but did not talk much and barely knew eachother back then. Over the summer we saw eachother a few times with mutual friend and hit things off. We started dating on September 11th and its been about two and a half months now. I was reluctant to get too involved in the reltationship because I did not think things would work out. We both liked eachother but we were afraid to actually give in to it because we both feared we would become too attached and then not get to see eachother. In all honesty it has not been any problem at all. She goes to school 150 miles away but we find ways to see eachother about every other weekend. I never really thought that long distance relationships were worth it but I am very pleased with how things are working out. I drive down to see her every once in a while and she catches rides home with friends from her school. I am very much looking forward to winter break with her. This Thanksgiving break has been alot of fun though.

Three Cups of Tea

So I went to see David Olver Relin's, the author of Three Cups of Tea and it was very interesting. I like when he talked about himself and his views alot more than when he discussed the book. He started off talking about what he used to do in his former career. He discussed how he used to interview famous people. Relin seemed to be very dissapointed with how American's are so consumed with famous people and how the famous people are not very interesting. This led to Relin making his statement of how the people with the least offer the most. Then that led to him going over the book briefly and how the plot of the book involves the main character, Greg Mortenson and his journey to the top of K2. Well Mortenson got lost and ended up in a village. In that village he became concerned with the residents becoming educated. He thought of ways to help that region get a proper education. Relin ties this idea of education to the recent dilemma of terrorism. He claims that the way to end terrorism is to educate. I have a hard time believing that education would solve all problems though. There will still be terrorists and people who hate America. I think he has a good idea but maybe he himself is too much of an extremist when it comes to his ideology.

NY to LA in 31 hours 4 minutes

In 2006 Alex Roy set a new world record for fastest cross country run. He traveled from New York City to Los Angeles in 31 hours and 4 minutes. The previous record was 32 hours and 7 minutes sit in 1983. Many skeptics said that it could not be done today with all the traffic on the road and new technologies that police employee to catch speeders. Alex Roy utilized a navigator to spot speed traps, thermal camera (to drive with the lights off), one radar detector, two laser jammers, seven GPS units, three police scanners, a CB radio, two sets of high tech binoculars, a plane flying above to spot speed traps, and multiple helicopters in the air. In order to beat the record he needed to keep an average speed of 90 mph in his 2000 BMW M5. Roy accomplished his goal and even beat it by an unleivable hour and three minutes. He was not pulled over one time on his journey and only had to evade the police one time.

Research Project Ideas

So this blog is just gonna be me going through ideas of what to write about in my research paper. I know the general idea is gonna be alternative fuels but that is a huge topic. I'm not sure if I want to go with alternative fuels for automobiles or alt. fuels for power. I'm thinking I will write about wind turbines. I would also like to go into some detail about hydro power and some of the new methods of extracting energy from waves. That would be too broad for a six page paper though. If i do wind turbines I could start with a summary of how they work, the history of them, and some general information. Then, I could go into more detail about the pro and cons. I want to write about this topic because Ive seen them around in Upstate New York and to me they look very elegant and effecient but others make a big fuss about them. I think that the positives far outweigh some of the negatives but I would like to look deeper into the issue. Sorry for the stupid blog but it was more brainstorming than a anything. If anyone reads this I would really appreciate it if you give me some feedback. That would be very helpful for the research paper.

UMBC vs. College

You know how in college movies all that is portrayed is partying and a lot of classwork. Well I find that UMBC has more of the latter and less of the first thing mentioned. Compared to other schools that my friends go to the amount of classwork is about the same depending on the amount of credits and classes being taken. There just seems to be a lot less partying and "college" stuff going on. I really enjoy all of my classes and the professors are all great. I have nothing to complain about here except for the lack of things going on after class especially on the weekends. The campus just feels like a ghost town on the weekends. Two of my three suite mates leave every weekend and its like I'm in a jail cell. There is no one to be found on campus on the weekends. I hoped that this was just something that i noticed and it's just because I haven't made friend or maybe its just because I'm a freshmen but I've talked to other freshmen and they all say the same thing. When I talk to upper class men they all say that there aren't any parties here and nothing goes on over the weekends. This isn't the college experience I was expecting but on the other hand it keeps me focused on why I am here and that is to get a good education. University of Maryland Baltimore County sure is a great place to send your child especially if you want them to get a good education and don't want to have to worry about what they might be doing when they are away.

Blogosphere 10/12

Chapter five in "They Say, I Say," by Gerald Graff, Cathy Birkenstein, and Russel Durst, the focus is on distinguishing between what the writer and what someone else's view is on a topic. If this is not done correctly the writing can be very confusing even when talking about a familiar subject. It is important to use voice markers to distinguish who's view is being expressed. I feel i have a difficult job smoothly doing this. It always looks like a fifth grader wrote it because I always end up making it so blatantly obvious.The templates that are given in this chapter seem the same way. they are all very obvious and overused I think. I will work on embedding my voice markers more smoothly.

Chapter six in the same book is about anticipating what the critics will say and responding to them in the text. The idea behind this is to make your text stronger so that way the naysayers will have nothing to argue with. My problem with this is, I always worry that the argument for the opposition will look more convincing than my own argument. I know that a lot of times it is just me worrying too much but, it still bothers me. In the end it always makes my arguments stronger but I still freak out about it. I am going to work more on incorporating other people's arguments into my writing and then arguing against it.