wooooooooohhhhoooooooo!!!!!!!!

Wow, this is our last weekend here without the stress of finals. I am so excited!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Darn I thought all those exclamation points would give me a bunch of words. I guess it doesn’t work that way. That’s ok because now you know how excited I am. Any who I’m guessing most of you are going to party like there is no tomorrow because this is the last weekend you can do that before the end of the year. I hope you all have fun. I’ve never been to a party here; never got the chance, not a big drinker, and I have a special someone back home so I don’t exactly see the point. So I’m going to go home this weekend and drive myself insane but I can do that when I’m home. I have two projects to work on, but one of them is painting stuff and the other is messing with a hot glue gun so sounds like fun to me, and I have to finish writing this paper and add in sources I feel like they are unnecessary because I can get enough information from the movies I’m using but that’s ok. I also get to tell my mom some news that I really hope she takes well and dye my hair for six flags… YAY SIX FLAGS!

After this weekend everything is going to fly by and I can’t wait. I want to go back to work and meet my crew at batman, 20^th ANIVERSORY BABY!, (and I’m turning 20 at the end of May, what a cowinkidink). I’m also super excited to ride x-flight! It looks so cool. I don’t remember if this is our last blog or not but if it is it was nice being in this class with everyone I think it was a pretty successful semester. If you get the chance this summer visit me at Batman and good luck next year!

Word count: 326

Happily Ever After

About 5 years ago in middle school, there was a girl and a guy in gym class. The guy being a 14 year old boy was being an idiot and throwing a shoe through the basketball hoop and almost hit the girl. After a while the guy and girl started hanging out and became best friends. The guy didn’t want to tell the girl that he secretly loved her so he kept it to himself and tried to do everything he could to make her happy. Eventually they got really close and spent almost every day together. The guy’s parents eventually started calling the girl their daughter in law because they saw that they both loved each other.

One day the girl started dating another boy. It lasted for a little bit till the boy broke up with her for another girl and broke her heart. The girl’s best friend was there for her and tried to help her through everything. One day the girl let the guy know that she liked him and she kissed him, catching him completely off guard. The next day the girl’s old boyfriend took her back and her best friend lost his chance. The girl and her best friend were getting really close and she couldn’t get over her feelings for him so her boyfriend told her that they couldn’t be friends anymore.

A year past and the girl and the guy thought about each other every day. She tried to see him on the way to school and took every chance she could to just get a glimpse of him. She finally realized this feeling wasn’t going to go away and made contact with her best friend again.

She broke up with her boyfriend and spent the best summer ever with her best friend. Until, he finally asked her to be his girlfriend. It’s been almost a year since then and they are planning their wedding for this summer right after their one year anniversary.

Word count: 334

more about my paper wooh!

For my paper for this class and for most of my research papers I normally come up with topics for my paper then go through all my sources and look for facts and quotes that support my topics. It normally doesn’t matter what class I am writing the paper for my method seems to be the same. My way is probably not the correct way of going about it. I think most people read through their sources first before they start on their paper but that is too much reading for me. I’d rather come up with an idea and skim to find reasonable support.

One time that really didn’t work out for me because I didn’t feel like writing a paper in high school so I used a friends paper from a different school and found an article to match it and apparently it matched it a little too well. I got a note back on my paper saying to put it in my own words. I couldn’t tell her that my paper was written before I found the article so it was in my own words because it wasn’t in MY words. Oh well.

For this paper I think I will be ok with the sources that I have. I also think I will have enough information since I am a Disney fanatic. I have plenty of movies to cite and compare to others over the years to help with my point. I also have multiple sources to back me up. Even though I normally don’t look at my sources before I start writing I defiantly make sure I have them before I start my paper.  I find if you need to search for a source when you are writing your paper you might get distracted which happens to me a lot. Well I hit my 300 word mark. Hope you enjoyed reading about my research process. Have a good weekend!

Word count: 326

close reading

I’m not the best at reading to begin with as I’ve mentioned before in my past blog about having ADHD. Close reading kind of distracts me from the story when I try to take notes. For the readings we had for Wednesday, as depressing as they were, I got a lot out of the discussions. We got a lot of things I would have never noticed reading the stories by myself. For that reason I’m not a fan of close reading because I would rather have a group discussion about a story to get every point of view to come up with the best analysis. I just need to figure out a way to do that in my head with close reading without getting distracted. I’m also still not exactly sure what parts I should take notes about because it seems when I take notes about stories we talk about everything that I didn’t take notes on.

I’m a little worried about close reading the sources for the research paper. Remembering and close reading folk tales and regular stories to get the meaning is one thing but factual research papers are another.  I think it will be a pain to find the right information to take notes on when I’m close reading. I’d rather just read more old stories with hidden meanings and have more discussions about them. The discussions are very interesting. I’m hoping to learn different methods of close reading to help with our research papers and other types of text so I can use all types of media for my research. It’s a little hard to talk about close reading for so long so I think I’m going to take up the rest of the space with this sentence sorry for the rambling but now I’m at 300 words.

Project 3

Over the years we have learned to love the Disney princesses. We even love the newest Disney princesses Rapunzel. The only way to keep up with the times and make sure girls of all ages will love and adore the princesses is to make sure they evolve with the ages. From Snow White to Rapunzel, Disney princesses have shown immense growth in how they conduct themselves, their independence, and confidence.

           With Snow White, Cinderella, and Sleeping Beauty the princes were the ones to go find the girl, rescue her, and marry her. They were helpless needed a man to save them. For Snow White, all the prince had to do was kiss her back to life and she would ride away with him, Cinderella needed to get away from her step sisters and he was the only one to help her, and Sleeping Beauty was stuck in a castle helpless to free herself. There was also not much to the guy characters. They were mostly nameless and all you needed to know was the guy will always come to save the day.

           After that, Disney took two steps forward and one step back with The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin. Ariel in The Little Mermaid was a little more confident and independent than the past princesses. She wanted to get out of the sea and meet a guy and she was determined to do what she wanted. Later, Belle, from Beauty and the Beast, was very smart and independent and refused to be with the big man in town who could provide for her. She ended up being the one to save the beast. Ariel and Belle were two wonderful role models for young girls. Then comes the one step back, Jasmine, from Aladdin. Yes she was very confident, but not very independent. She knew she shouldn’t be a prize to be won but in the end Aladdin needed to save her just like the original princesses.

           Finally, Disney seems to start to get that girls need confident, independent role models. Then came Princess and the Frog and Tangled. Both were very independent princesses that could overcome any challenge thrown at them. Rapunzel, from Tangled, didn’t exactly need Flynn Ryder but she thought she did; she was made to think she was this fragile little flower. Fragile little flower or not she definitely took control and showed great confidence. Disney has come a long way and their latest movies show it.

Tangleed Review

Before Rapunzel was born her mother was very sick and needed the healing powers of a special flower. They found the flower to heal the queen and Rapunzel was born. Her hair inherited the healing powers of the flower. Later mother Gothel , knowing about the healing powers, stole Rapunzel from the castle and kept her locked in a tower so she could use the healing powers to keep herself young. Rapunzel is turning 18 and her hair has grown to 70-feet. After 18 years of being locked in the tower she decided it’s time for her to go out and explore the world beyond those walls. One day a local thief named Flynn Ryder scales the tower and is held captive by Rapunzel. She strikes a deal with the charming thief to act as her guide to take her to see the floating lights she has seen every year on her birthday. Now, Rapunzel is in for the most exciting adventure of her life.

In past Disney princess movies they were mostly tailored to young girls who still believe in princesses and fairy tales. For example, Cinderella, The Little Mermaid, and The Princess and the Frog. For other princess movies they seemed to want to expand their audience to young boys as well. They made Aladdin, Snow White, and now Tangled. Years ago both girl dominated princess movies and princess movies that expanded to young males thrived. Up until the last two Disney princess movies, The Princess and the Frog, and Tangled. The Princess and the Frog didn’t do as well as they hoped it would. To recover from that, they decided to attempt to expand their audience on Tangled.

Tangled was a great success. Not only did they expand their audience to young males but to people of all ages. When I went to see the movie in theatres I was accompanied by my boyfriend at the time. He is a Halo playing nut who wears black clothes and tends to keep to himself. We both came out of that theater in love with the movie. My sister also probably watches the movie once a week and to this day my mom has yet to rip her hair out from being sick of it. It never gets old.

Based off my experience of the text of Rapunzel before Disney turned it into a movie I think Disney did a great job. All I knew about the story of Rapunzel was, “Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!” and that is it. It is a great take on a story I never really knew. It has lively characters that are funny and relate able, an amazing plot that keeps you glued, and a wonderful ending that makes you never give up on dreams.

Overall this movie is great for everyone. Whether you are a high school student going out on their own, a young girl dreaming of her prince charming (or in this case Flynn Ryder), or a boy who thinks he is all that and a bag of chips but knows someday a girl will change that. This movie is for the dreamer in all of us and helps us see the dreams that come true every day in reality. I know I will keep this story in my heart for the rest of my life, and I think anyone else who has seen this movie will do that same.

 Bestbuy.com- screen name: ali92

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Tangled+-+Widescreen+Dubbed+Subtitle+AC3+-+DVD/2068104.p?id=1895766&skuId=2068104&st=tangled&lp=5&cp=1#tabbed-customerreviews

DISNEY WORLD!!!

Over spring break I am going to the place where dreams come true. DISNEY WORLD!! I may be turning 20 in May but I love Disney world. I have gone there 15 times in my life. One of the main things I love doing in Disney World is take someone who has never been there before and show them all the fun things there are to do. We also have a lot of fun and unpleasant adventures on the way there and while we are there.

I have a special needs sister. She is 18 but she has the mental capacity of a 3-year-old. The first adventure starts with getting through security. She doesn’t have very good balance and feels the need to touch the sides of the metal detector. Which just in case you didn’t know, that sets it off. She also doesn’t like loud noises and doesn’t understand when a bunch of people come up and surround her. So normally she sets off the metal detector. A bunch of people in blue gloves come over to find out if she has a bomb while my aunt is freaking out. I’m trying to figure out what to do and our stuff is going through the scanner without anyone to get it at the end. This year we will attempt to avoid all that. Wish us luck. The next adventure is whether or not she will freak out about getting on the plane, fun stuff. Eventually she will get on.

After that we know at some point after we get to Disney World she will get sick. We don’t know where or when but it will happen. Oh and I forgot to mention on top of all this she is scared of the characters that walk around the park. Lucky for us, if I remember correctly they don’t come up to children anymore. You have to get into a line to see them. There are plenty of adventures in Disney with my sister but she loves it and I’m defiantly going to enjoy the sun and showing my boyfriend everything Disney has to offer.

Word count: 357

MOVIE NIGHT!!

Five thirty on a Thursday night I walked to The Movie Fan with my roommate. At first I never even knew where it was. When I saw it I didn’t even recognize it even though I recognized everything else around it. The first thing I noticed was the table section which confused me because I’ve never seen a place to eat in a movie store. I thought that was very different but I didn’t know what to think about it. I still don’t. Once I got in I was shocked by how many movies there were in such a small place.

Once my roommate and I took it all in we started cruising through the isles looking at all the titles we had to choose from. We probably spent an hour just looking around. I think I could go my entire life watching a few movies a day and still not make it through all the movies in that store. Even if I didn’t include any new movies and excluded all the movies I don’t like I still couldn’t see them all. We found a bunch of movies that we wanted to watch. It’s so much nicer than how Netflix works. With Netflix there is no way to see every movie they have available and unless you know what movie you want to watch there is no way to look through a broad enough list to find one you want to watch.

I liked the Movie Fan because of how much they carry and the local feel. When I use to go to the chain movie stores it wasn’t that exciting, but that might be because I was little and didn’t care. The other thing that was nice is how approachable the staff is unlike the big chain movie rental places are. The one thing I didn’t like about The Movie Fan was that to rent a movie you have to have an account which prevented me from getting a movie. Other than that I thought it was a good experience.

Word count: 344

Cosmo

Everyone has seen Cosmopolitan magazine in stores and most girls have either read an issue or two or are addicted (like me). It is the girl bible. The fact that I'm addicted to this magazine is beyond me. Every issue has some celebrity on the front shouting to the world that this magazine has all the latest and greatest gossip on every celebrity they could get on camera good or bad. Now I’m not one to care about what celebrities are up to. I don’t care if Snookie showed every guy in the world her who ha on live TV or which guy cheated now. Because the first thing everyone sees is a celeb that takes up the whole cover I originally didn’t give a thought to ever looking at the magazine. That is until my friend bought a copy and I started reading it for a story she told me about. Now I am a subscriber and I’ve noticed the other parts of the covers I didn’t see before because I couldn’t see past the celeb. Literally... Most of the time whoever is on the cover is covering half of the title. Most of the time this would be a bad thing because if you can’t see the title you don’t know what it is so the chances of picking it up and reading it are slim to none. Cosmo got around that, they are so popular that all you need to see is parts of the title to know it is Cosmo/the girl bible. The cover also features the biggest stories which you can bet one of them is about sex and you will see it in big letters on the cover. Also, just like how there is more than just celebrity gossip, there is a lot more than what’s on the cover. The cover is what draws people in even though it stays almost the same with every issue but the content keeps you hooked.

 

Word count: 329