Awesome Day

The weather is amazing today. Its nice and cool outside... I'm only coming back inside to write a blog entry.

I'm not used to this kind of weather, this is a typical mid January day in Miami. Amazing what a difference being inland and only 350 miles away makes. January in Miami is my favorite time of year. Drop below 50 and you've lost me though, I can't deal with that. My blood isn't made for that. Some people like cold - up north type weather though, as Hunter S. Thompson says about those types of people "my blood is too thick for California. I've never been able to properly explain myself here." Okay, okay, I just had to find an excuse for a Thompson quote, crucify me. ANYWAYS...

Kate!!!!- I really, really, REALLY hope you have another outdoors class. That was TOTALLY awesome. It kept my ADD at bay and kept me kind of focused.

And as for what we were talking about fair trade (in reference to the essay on consumerism) you guys should DEFFINITELY go to the farmers market. I go every Wednesday, its freggin awesome. I reccomened you guys try the fresh hummus... and there is a stand that sells awesome fresh bread. And they sometimes have pretty good music there too. Support your local business! Okay, yes I'm an urban hippie... but seriously, check it out.

See everyone next week. Cheers!!

-John

titans vs lights

well i think im gonna compare the covers of remember the titans and friday night lights. i really dont know how to compare them. i mean kate helped alot today but im still pretty confused on how to compare mine. well i better start tomorrow on it so i dont procrastinate and then dont do it. its a start to fight my procrastination problem. wish me luck. well i just wanna say i am extremly glad we have john in out band. He is really good at taking what we all say and expanding it and making it sound alot smarter then how we say it, So i just wannna say thanks john. Well the main reason i wanted to compare the two covers i picked was the fact that i love football and both movies and pretty muvh forgot that we were only comparing the covers but its all good i know i can do it. well i will see you guys on tuesday. good luck on your papers and have a safe weekend. if you need me you know how to reach me.

UUUGGGGGHHHH!!!!!

So... Unfortunately, I kind of have a lot to say….first of all…this was the hardest choice of essay we need to write about. I had no idea what to pick or who to pick. I had the options of ads or the option of picking friends from my social network. So I ended up picking the facebook friends. Not even sure if I might do it but mite change it.

So…I just wanna say about the band who wrote trash about the teacher……. I just want to say WWWWWOOOOOOWWWWW!!!! Never in my life someone would such a thing especially since they know that she is the one that’s going to be grading this… What in the world were they thinking. I didn’t know college students would have balls to write these things..

So…. Our band rocks…..we do our work and even have time for a break….. Good Job everyone.

-Rosa Taveras

crazy week...

I'm having a really hard time with this ad thing I picked one for two different airlines and another for Calvin Klein. I have no idea how I'm going to be able to write so much on this essay. Anyways, when we went over the reading in our book from What Matter's in America that kind of helped. Seeing how she compared the two and showed the differences as well (wish I could write like that). I'm defiantly the type that does the whole point by point and I kind of hate it. But, it's easy and seriously I just want to get a good grade in this class. Kate is probably by FAR!!! the BEST! teacher I have had in Santa Fe... and with my learning problems and all she really helps me out a lot to understand and see from places I would have never even thought. I think she kicks ass! I am completely at loss for words when it comes to that idiot that said what he said about her my God! Didn't someone in his life tell him at least once "if you don't have something nice to say then don't say it at all!" Anyways I'm guessing the boy was on his man period and wasn't able to get his glazed donuts, so he needed someone to blame... way to go on blaming you're teacher what an ass he made of himself. I don't even know if that has anything to do with the class. But, hey I hope at least by the weekend when I start writing my rough draft I'll understand what I'm doing when I'm comparing and contrasting my two adds! :)



-Allie Garcia

you know what else... where >> I << come from...

...You probably fail for insulting the professor.

That was my lame attempt at creativity. Hey, but I caught my ""audience's"" attention... didn't I?
I should get an A for that one.

Anyways... that was also a creative attempt at being narcissistic. I think I succeeded, and my admission that I believe that I did in-fact... succeed only adds to the narcissistic writing style of this blog post. Hey, I'm using what we learned in class today! Get it...

No I'm not trying to make satire about what we learned, I really did learn some things today in class... like how to improve my sentence structure... which, thank you Kate... will torment me and will only add to my obsessive compulsive tendencies. Now, instead of writing my papers 1 hour before they are due, I am going to have to start a week early so I can revise and re-revise... etc.

I almost died today on my way home. I was riding my scooter home and some a**hole in a black Nissan Maxima decided to tail me right as I was making a right on to NW 13 St from 39 ave. He rode right up on my tail and basically sped up to me as I was turning. I fell off, but I won't make this uber dramatic. (I used uber... we talked about how the English language borrows from other languages today) ((except I can't, for the life of me, figure out how to write an umlaut)). I just scraped my knee and burned my arm pretty badly. But its all good. "Why did he mention that" you might ask... because there are thousands of scooters in this city, so don't drive like an asshole... please... 6'0" 220 lb guys on tiny 50cc scooters don't make for a good mix... or rapid turning for that matter. So, share the road.

By the way... isn't it awesome how there is a "gif" file for EVERYTHING.

Bad Advertising

I don't know how relevant this is to whatever we should be writing on this blog - but the class discussion today prompted me to really think about the target audiences in ad campaigns.  I found myself remembering some thoughts I had to myself during one ad campaign... I think it was for the Dodge 1500.  In those ads, they would have a few guys take the truck around some obstacle course which would probably destroy my humble sedan.  They would drive through fire, massive potholes, rocks, desert, and shallow lakes.  The guys in the car would be screaming and really enjoying there time in the car.  Thats great... if your marketing that car to that audience.  But I thought to myself, honestly... who honestly is going to buy a car for that purpose alone?  Granted, there might be a GREAT niche audience that campaign might've been geared towards, but I think the advertisers really missed the point that they are trying to sell VOLUME, and you can't get a high volume of sales by advertising to a tiny audience.  And, I think this was one of the great failure of the American automotive sector - they kept on pushing products in an economic environment where people weren't looking for ultra rugged outdoor sports cars, they wanted something that could get them to and from work without breaking the bank.  I'm a guy, and I do some "guy" gender roll things... ie: watch football... drink gratuitous amounts of beer,  hell, I even change my own oil... but the last thing I want is a truck which is going to contribute to the destruction of our planet and cause me to go bankrupt via my gas-card.  Its 2009, not 1959, and GM, Chrysler, and Ford don't really realize that.  I think if ad campaigns would find a way to focus on guys like me, they would find a wider audience.  

Or maybe I just over thought and overwrote this whole thing....  

Peer Reading!!!

So….we had an assignment to write an essay and I wrote mine on how I am nostalgic about the 90s and how I enjoyed growing up In that era, when there wasn’t much violence and people were actually normal and humble. Most people nowadays are kind of stuck up. So when I go to class I thought I did okay but when I began peer reading my partners paper….mines went to crap. I really couldn’t find any errors. Even though Kate said that there’s always something wrong. It was so descriptive and great vivid imaged and my essay didn’t sound as good as hers. Then I felt I wanted to write my essay all over and change topics.

-Rosa Taveras

Im a slacker...

Ok well in class tuesday we were supposed to have our rough drafts to our narrative essays done and turn them in but i didn't go to class because i didn't do it. well i was going to do it because i knew that if i didn't it would hurt my grade but then last thursday in my 8:00am public speaking class our professer told us we had to do a paper and it was due tuesday and i already missed one in there so i went ahead and done the one for public speaking and completly forgot about the narrative essay until like right before class tuesday because i had worked on the other paper all weekend. I mean i know should have just done it when she first handed it out but damn i had to do alot for that paper. but its cool i know it was all my fault because im the biggest procrastinator in the world. I always wait till the last minute and usually that screws me over so i think from now on im gonna try to do all my work before its due because waiting till the last minute has not worked for me lately.

the peer review

So we had to make comments on other people's rough drafts and I thought it was going to be easy! I wanted to pull my hair out!!! I read the essay like over and over again and finally thinking to myself this is NOT a ROUGH draft! haha it was soooo good. Seriously he was already done in my opinion with his paper. It made me feel like an idiot thinking oh my god! He is reading my paper probably thinking I was either not feeling good when I wrote it or i'm just plain stupid! haha I'm now debating whether or not to rewrite my whole entire paper now! haha it might sound funny my it's true as sad as it is....

-Allie Garcia

I ran across this article while going to check my email on AOL.  I don't particularly trust all of my news "stuff" from AOL, but this struck me, as we had been discussing this same exact thing in class.  People tattooing brands on themselves!!!  What the hell is this?   And people are so concerned with like RF Id chips, and a new world order, and all this crap... but it feel like the ordinary person is ushering in the takeover of a corporate controlled life!!  What the hell has Nike ever done for you, except have your dunks match nicely with your shirt.

http://www.stylelist.com/blog/2009/09/10/designer-tattoos-getting-a-logo-inked-on-your-body/

Nike Sweatshops: True or False?

Ok so i was just searching nike sweatshops because i didn't really believe that there were any and well now i think i may be wrong. If you even type in Nike Sweats the first thing that pops up is a site about sweatshops. So now i know they do have them. when you search pictures too you can find some of women in sweatshops working on nike shoes and accessories.

I found the emails between Nike and Peretti actually kind of pointless. i don't get why he would want shoes that had "Sweatshop" on them. I understand he said that he wanted it to dedicate to all the workers for all there hard work but im thinking "really dude? stop being an ass." he was just trying to be a smart ass because he wanted to start some drama which it did and became a popular topic so if thats what he was trying to achieve way to go! But still your an ass. Oh and the way he asked for a picture of the girl working on his shoes....un-called for that was a low blow.


-Josh Fortson

obama speech..

I honestly don't know exactly what to write about in this blog...but I decided to talk about the Obama speech. I enjoyed some of the things he said tonight. I have to be honest something about Obama in my opinion scares me! But, I am young so I'm still learning, anyways there was somethings in his speech about healthcare I really respected and appreciated from him. Like how he wants everyone in America to be able to have health insurance, and the whole thing about medicare. My father not to long ago had cancer, and thinking back on it if we didn't have health insurance I have no idea what would have happened, and where I would be today emotionally. My heart goes out to the people that have had issues with not being able to pay for medicine or surgery, which could have saved that person. I'm glad to know that he is making it one of his top priorities in changing some of the ways in America.

-Allie Garcia

Just Do It!!!

Well… let me just say that even though it wasn’t discussed in class yet… the article about this man who ordered a pair of Nike shoes and wanted to write sweatshop on. The emails sent back and forth were the funniest thing but Perreti was a bit harsh at the end with the whole can you do me a favor and send me a picture of the little Korean girl who is making them. That was a just a bit a rude and unnecessary . I know that maybe if he didn’t write why he wanted the word sweatshop then they would’ve written it for him. This is a lesson for you not to be rude to people… besides the customer is always write.

On other news, we would’ve rocked the responses but of course our professor was rushing us. But at least we finished…. Good job Th3 Unkn0wn$!!!

-ROSA TAVERAS

The Hunt

Today was interesting. I never saw Pollan's article the way I saw it today. It's crazy to think of hunting the way he did almost in the sense, like he said, "porn hunt" or something to that affect. I understood today what he meant, but from a different perspective. I was completely blown away to see through different eyes and to experience his disgust. Like I referred today in class, it was almost like the movie Taken; going out on a "hunt" looking for an aimless, innocent soul wondering around and attacking the being at its weakest moment. After having complete control of the victim using it for their pleasure, it's sad to see it that way but it's the way we as mankind were created. I believe God made us as humans with many animal instincts, which is why we have men who abuse there wives or family, as well as women go crazy and fight for their young. I really enjoyed rethinking and looking more in depth with Pollan's reading. I understand how he was disgusted, but also believe that it's the way God created mankind to always be out on a "hunt" in some sort of way. Also, I was very pleased to read the ending of his article and to see what, how, and why he redefined his definition of the "perfect meal." I have had the pleasure of reading his article and know about him. I am very interested into looking more into his upcoming stories and events.

Allie Garcia

Beals vs Pollan

Well after reading Beal's "Faceless on Facebook" i really thought that most of our reading would be a good amount of reading but wouldn't be too long but then i read Pollan's "The Modern Hunter-Gatherer" and realized how wrong i actually was. Ha well i enjoyed reading what Beals had to say in her article apt bout how people judge you based on whats on your profile because as almost everyone here recently i also have a facebook and people constantly ask why i put some stuff on my facebook. But at the end of the article i was disappointed on how she acted like she was just too good for facebook. to me that was like her saying she was better than everyone that usues it but no human is better than another. In Pollans article he used alot of big words and some confused me but overall it was a good article i enjoyed reading it and didn't think it was all that bad except for how damn long it was!!! But while i was reading the part in Pollan's article about cannibalism it made me think about the movie Wrong Turn.

Which that movie was pretty horrible. I mean if it really happened that would be pretty creepy but as for watching it well i have to say it kinda sucked and the acting was not so good. The only reason most people watched it is because there were good looking women in revealing clothes running for their lives. The only person i knew in the movie was Eliza Dushku, who also played in The New Guy which in my opinion was a very funny movie. Well overall i enjoyed "Faceless on Facebook" more but Pollan's article wasn;t all that bad either.

-Josh Fortson

Facebook/Article

Let me tell you something... it was a great first class discussion in class. I'm not saying it because I want my teacher to read this and give me an "A" but because everyone can actually relate to facebook. I was actually interested in the topic... I mean I have a facebook and I know what people care about. This was our first reading but when I went ahead and read the second one we needed to read for Thursday….it wasn’t that interesting as the first one. It was long and long and just very long… I mean it had a point of how she related it to class but it was too long. I kind of like the topics that we can relate to rather than having to read some author I don’t even know with a topic that isn’t appealing.


-Rosa Taveras