River City 2

I wanted to turn this into two blogs it means less work for me so here is part 2 of the River City writers. When the speaking started the host got up and was going to introduce the speakers (She was kind of attractive, but that’s a different subject). The first speaker was a lady from Australia with a degree in Linguistics (She was attractive too, still a different subject). When she spoke you can clearly tell she was not from this country and if she didn’t tell me she was from Australia I would have thought she was British. She more than lived up to her degree half the words she said I didn’t know the meaning of I just tried to laugh with the crowd whenever she made a joke. Her topic was the evolution of language which in class earlier that week we debated ( Mainly Ryan, Taylor, Jackson, Ms. Sumner, and I, and Ryan’s team put up good points). At the end I wanted to debate her too but we went right off into the next speaker who was a writer for the New York Times. He was a middle aged man with a cane (never told us why) and his topic was the “Shot heard around the world” in baseball because he discovered that the New York Giants were stealing the signals of the opposing team. His book was like a story with him as the narrator and main character. To end the series was another lady and her topic was the events surrounding George Soros (well actually it was the war in his country but, right now I forgot the country.) Well her story was about a group of guerilla fighters supported largely by a man from the country working in New York as the head of a construction company. He was funding a private army. After she ended her speech it was question time. After Jackson got to ask his question I asked the author of the book about the war how did this man build a private army she told me that our government turned a blind eye on what he was doing as a means to kind of help that country (very interesting). That’s the only question I got out someone sort of hogged question time (If you went you know). At the end there was the opportunity to by their books and surprising I wanted to by some of the books (but, I had little money) and I had to finally leave my small sample of the good life.

River City 1

This Thursday I had to go to the river city writers series event. (You might as well made it a official class assignment because almost everyone went). First I had trouble getting out there because the link from the blog didn’t work so I had to mapquest it and I didn’t’ have ink so I had to memorize the best I can the directions and I was on my way. Even though I had all the trouble getting the directions it was relatively easy to get out there. I never knew the neighborhood existed and when I came down the street I guessed that the big mansion that stood out from the rest of the other houses was where I was suppose to be. So I approached feeling a little uncomfortable because I felt out of place in the extravagant neighborhood and I walked up and met Jonathan he was talking to two girls and I asked what we were suppose to do and we went in. It was like walking into MTV cribs I forgot for a moment we were there to listen to the authors of the books. I then met Jackson (last name for a first name always cool) and we had the same idea to get food. Even though there were only appetizers I made the best of it by being greedy but it was good Jackson told me that our dear teacher either cooked or brought the pork tenderloins but if so please cook or refer me to the place where they make those. As everyone showed we were about to start the speaking (by the way I thought rich people were on time, not saying there was anything wrong with being late, but it fit’s a different stereotype).

Abuse

Part 2 of the Psychology class (this class really helps with blogs) in today’s class we talked about more than criminal insanity but I guess this relates this part of the class was about spousal abuse between heterosexual relationships. Where we went over cases where the women in the relationships were pushed to far and they ended up killing the husband (one lady poured gasoline on her husband and torched him). Ironically he felt that these women shouldn’t get off with their crimes (strange justice). Towards the end of the class he called all the girls stupid for even dealing with men (thanks for that) he said if they were smart they would stay away from us because he feels that we will all abuse women and only want sex (I definitely disagree). Then he went to answer questions from the crowd and the lady behind us gave him a situation of abuse (which I think she was referring to her own life by the way she acts and her demeanor) where he thought the woman should fight back but the lady behind me said that the woman would feel scared if she were to confront the man (not the girls I know). Then he asked if any of the other girls knew situations where the boyfriend beats the girl and there were plenty some said the girl blamed herself for him beating her others blamed drugs and alcohol and the girls they knew still wouldn’t leave the boyfriend (strange). But that’s how class went and mostly how it goes everytime.

The Law

Once again the subject will be psychology (it’s really competing for the position of the most interesting class.) Today’s subject was still around criminal behavior defining criminally insane (by the way my teacher thought was stupid.) He told us how the law defines a crime and who is criminally insane it is mostly based on the concept of free will where we choose to do good or bad under the law and you can only be convicted if they can prove that you had an evil will. It was a normal class where I usually agreed until we came across the concept of who is the victim of crime in criminal court the victim is not you or the dead person’s family (surprise) it is actually the government. This is based on the idea of Old English law where every crime is against the King. He stated examples of cases where the criminal would get off on a light sentence and the family would be upset and it would be on the news (of course) and he said it made him upset because he felt the family was stupid because they weren’t the victim’s (very cold and emotionless). He pointed his solution would be that you could take the offender to civil court and sue them I just felt that there was no justice being served yeah you could sue them and get money but it’s the principle of the fact that you can’t kill someone and be able to serve little to no punishment (O.J. Simpson). I guess he feels this way because he is a very logical person and I can see that he wouldn’t let emotion effect his judgement.

The other part of the Olympics

What is the deal with the Olympics has there been this much controversy with it It’s in China and every country has some opinion about it even the Chinese they have rules and regulations and they are being stubborn and not listening to other countries. Like here in the United States of America they told our Athletes not to speak during press release so they won’t accidentally offend the Chinese nation because they are a little sensitive about what we think about their communist nation. How did the Olympics get so political even terrorist want to have a say so China has already caught terrorist before the games even begin. Who we should feel sorry for is the athletes they have trained so hard to get to this point in their career and for so political garbage can break your concentration or get in the way of your performance. I hope the events would be entertaining and exciting and that the struggles of our world don’t interfere with a historic tradition.

Not so safe feeling

At our school I couldn’t believe that one of our students has been kidnapped and I don’t know all the details but that makes me feel uneasy. ( wonder who it was and if they caught him or her). Isn’t this one of the many incidents that has happened this semester to the students it seems like the police is slacking a bit. The school image will not look good to the other students and future students if they can’t go to classes and not feel safe. Most people who have been kidnapped usually don’t turn up unless they are dead. ( Yeah good luck person.) Just don’t hope it happens to you or me. Well all I can hope for is the best and that person’s safe return to their families because I can’t imagine what they are going through.

Mayor Resigns

This week the mayor of Memphis put in his resignation and is going to leave the mayor’s office on July 31 and he said the reason was he felt another calling. Kind of strange but whatever works for him. Now in most situations abandoning one’s position is something that I would hold against someone and call them a quitter, but he said his calling was somewhere else and he’s going to run for a position on the school board. He has experience in that field because before he was mayor he held the position. So I don’t know if is responding to our current school situation or he is just board. He might just help the situation and improve our school system. Maybe he is what we need but he will come with controversy as his whole career. So I just wish the best of luck for him and us because I was born with him as mayor and he’s been that way my whole life and I can’t imagine someone else as mayor.

Lady on the Toilet

I had to speak on this because it was one of those stories that just leave you speechless and thinking “what in the world”. This is about the woman stuck on the toilet for two years by her own free will. At first when I heard the story I thought the boyfriend had locked her in the restroom and was some form of sick torture but it wasn’t. She one day went to the toilet and just never left it for two years her legs began to form around the toilet. It’s not like he didn’t care about her he tried to get her off the toilet but she kept saying maybe tomorrow, so he kept bringing her food and water (how nice). One thing I want to know is what she went in there for in the first place. In the end the boyfriend was charged for mistreatment of a dependent adult (never heard of the charge and WHAT???). It’s just something that never happens in 2 lifetimes and goes with one of the strangest things to happen in a long time. They don’t have pictures of the people but I assume they aren’t the smartest people you would ever meet.

Aneorexia

Again the class I most like to talk about psychology class provided me with a little more to discuss about. I’ll just start with today, It was torture we had to go over mental disorders and the ones chosen today were anorexia and bulimia. He had some lovely pictures of anorexic girls, one thing you might not know about me is I hate the sight of gore, anorexic girls, and nasty skin problems, and he had very skinny girls on a projector and he had them up there for the majority of the class and I was uncomfortable in my seat, I wasn’t alone though the guy beside me felt the same way. Well he of course stated the reasons behind anorexia and bulimia blaming most of it on societies demands for people to look skinny and lose weight. Supermodels, advertising, and just the benefit of looking good puts pressure on these girls. He definitely didn’t like how in the gymnastic and cheerleading world to be the best some girls will turn to these solutions to win. Even more amazing is that an anorexic person will be on the verge of dying and still decline to eat. Just as a society don’t by in to the image that ads want you to see and eating healthy and exercising is the only way to go.

Meeting

One Tuesday around dinner time I tuned in to a meeting on news channel 3 ( I woke up and it was on). The meeting was in response to the Lester St. murders. City leaders got together to discuss the problems in out city. The most important person there was A.C Wharton (Memphis city mayor wasn’t there). When I tuned in they were talking about the Memphis City Schools and the crime that follows it. They had good points saying that the crime rate in the city would go down if we start people when they are young, but as stated before the way that they approach it is ineffective. One lady had probably the best idea of raising a teachers salary. When she said that she got a strong applause. Teachers have to go to college get masters degrees and then have to deal with bad children for a little salary, They really should be the highest paid profession but that’s not going to happen. Also not surprising the place was half empty so most of the city doesn’t care. If we continue to not care nothing will change and look forward to many more headline news stories.

NCAA Tournament

Right now is one of the best times of the year where a whole lot of teams are now playing for their way in to the NCAA tournament. All day games are played to decide who gets in the field of 65 ( it’s really 64 but there is the for no reason play in game that doesn’t matter between teams who almost didn’t make it and the winner will most likely be eliminated in the first round ). Now we don’t have to worry about our team and not even the other teams in the state (Vanderbilt and Tennessee) but many schools are playing for post season future. What makes it so exciting is every year some team gets into the tournament and plays the role of the proverbial “Cinderella” and thus the name March Madness because everything ends up going wrong. With both the men’s tournaments and the women’s going on at the same time there is plenty basketball to go around. In the Women’s tournament it looks like the Lady Vols might repeat as champs and our Tigers have a rough road ahead of them but they could be cutting down the nets in San Antonio.