le conclusion-ay

When I look back over my blog I can really say to myself “THANK GOD IT’S OVER!!!!!” Blogging was one of my weakest aspects of English class. This blog taught me to remind myself every week of what I have to do. I may have hated this blog but it taught me a lot of lessons like getting 0 out of 20 really does lower your grade. Also it taught me it’s not the best idea to wait till the last minute to do my blogs. Although this lesson may still need to sink in (as I type this on Monday at 9:00) at least I realize now it’s not good to procrastinate.

English has been great this year and as the year wraps up and I look back on my blog I can definitely tell I’ve learned a lot. At the beginning of the year I wasn’t exactly the perfect student. As I look at the dates a lot of my blogs were published I can see I may not have taken them too seriously. As my grade took a slight hit I can see I started to get the picture. This would be the reason I have about ten blogs that were all published on the same day.

As we look later into the year my blogs started being published…… around… the time they were given to us and with the extra time I got to put a little more depth into my blogs and a little more personality into what I was writing like when I said “She’s been screwing with almost EVERYONE in the novel and look what happens in the end..... SHE BURNS TO DEATH“. It’s almost as though I was there giving my own sarcastic opinion.

Although I like to joke about it I was definitely a slacker at the beginning of the year, but after the constant look of disappointment I would get from Mrs. Gilman every time I had missed a blog. I knew I should probably change. Well…. Here I am Tuesday night, the due date for the BIG blog with the thought of a disappointed Mrs. Gilman lingering in the back of my mind I hunch over the keyboard typing away making sure to get my point across. My point being…… IT’S ON TIME!!!!! Yes. That’s right Mathew Geisler’s blog is ON TIME. No more making up. No more zeros.

And to thank I have Mrs. Gilman. You’ve made freshman year one of the coolest freshman years ever. It sucks that we won’t be having you next year to make us feel guilty about not doing our blogs. But after this I don’t think I’ll need Mrs. Gilman to remind me and let me make my blogs up. After everything this year I’m pretty confident the rest of my high school will be fine. Who knows maybe in a couple years when Mrs. Gilman’s staplers disappear suspiciously and end up duct taped randomly around the room, she’ll remember…….. Wait that’s 500? Okay all done!!!!!!!!!!!

Thinking back through assignments and projects brings back good and bad memories. The most memorable project was Poetry Out Loud. when we started to memorize "Fire and Ice" it was oddly fun using hand motions to remember what the next line was. I got "can't remember" by i have noclue. Before memorizing the poem, we did a class analysis of our poem, and I was confident that I understood the poets message.I started the technique when I first got my poem, it worked very well. I usually practiced my poem at night so no one could hear me. Now that I look back, it's really funny how frustrated I was when I messed up, I had to start from the beginning until I got it right. When I memorized halfway through the poem I stopped the hand signs and started memorizing anywhere I went. My friends usually were my audience hearing my practice and practice and practice.

I got my poem memorized about an hour until the class competition. I was SUPER nervous the day of the competition. The main thing I was afraid of was completely drawing a blank in the middle of my poe,. I did a surprisingly good job! Got tied for second place and went to the school competition. This was the most memorable because it was hard but fun, and it really felt like exercising an important skill.

good experience with poetry

my fondest memory dealing with poetry is from the fourth grade. My teacher, Mr. Brewer was the typical "greener". Every week he'd take the class to LBA (a park by our school) and we'd get an hour to write a poem and than we'd go back to the school and have a couple hours to ead our poems. I loved this because writing poetry at a park witrh all your friends is alot of fun! also we'de have poetry competitions sometimes.

ever since my fourth grade year i've loved writing and reading poetry. the one thing i love most about poetry is that there isn't ever a wrong answer. Mr. B taught me to love and respect other's poetry too.

Karma

I believe the overall message of the novel Great Expectations by Charles Dickens is don't mess with others because you'll get what you deserve in the end. the most prominent way this idea is shown is with Miss Havisham. She's been screwing with almost EVERYONE in the novel and look what happens in the end..... SHE BURNS TO DEATH. A more subtle way this is shown is with Pip he kind of abandons his family because he was embarrassed to be poor and in the end he loses all his money and his brother in law Joe has to bail him out. In the end i think everyone got what they deserved. I think Pip learned that money Really isn't everything and family will always be there for you but money is fleeting.

Connections

a movie that i think parallels the themes and overall plot in "Great Expectations" is the movie "pirate Radio". In this movie rock and roll isn't played in Brittan and isn't aloud to be played due to the controlling government. The government can be looked at like everybody in a higher position than Pip. through this entire book there is someone trying to control Pip and a lot of the time these people don't care what pip wants.

In order to play there beloved rock and roll a group of radio Djs live on a boat broadcasting constant rock and roll to brittan. There are parts in the movie where the crew are fighting amongst each other. this could be seen as Pip's conscious. Pip seems to always be going through some sort of emotional struggle.

The actions taken by the crew members are considered illegal and although pip hasn't done anything against the law many of his actions i believe will have nagative consiquences.

In stage two of Great Expectations pip is now a gentlemen and has a completely different lifestyle and a new look on life. On top of that The pale young gentlemen from Miss Havishams is now Pips roommate and good friend. One major contrast between pip and herbert(the pale young gentlemen) is that herbert actually works for his money and pip just acquires it from Mr. Jaggers. I think my feelings of pip have changed also I'm starting to feel like Pip is becoming a spoiled "gentleman".

Pip is telling you to remember a part of your life that has made you who you are today. This experience that Pip has changes him in negative ways. Pip has become more mature in his thoughts and actions. He doesn’t make a game of describing his opinion of uncle Pumblechook and he starts to use more offensive words against Pumblechook. Uncle Pumblechook isn’t the only one who Pip starts to think differently of. Pips thoughts about himself and Joe also change. Pip used to not care about what others think, but after being insulted by Estella, Pip begins to care about social status and class. He says he doesn’t like his “course hands and thick boots.” He cares to a point where he begins to get embarrassed by Joe and his low education. I think he is slowly pushing away from Joe.

One big moment in my life is when my brother moved out. I used to always follow him around and do what he was doing. After he left I started finding new things that I actually liked. It's helped me to become much more independant and im finding more things i like.

blog questions

In the beginning the book was hard to understand, but after getting used to the language and how the characters talk about the Great Expectations became a ted bit interesting. What I dont get though is at the end of the third chapter (pg. 19) when the 1st convict says "Where is he?...I'll hunt him down like a blood hound." The convict is talking about the man Pip said he saw in the marshes before giving him the food. Why is this man scared of there being another convict in the swamp?

dishonesty for pleasure

Wilde depicts the use of dishonesty for pleasure or self-gain in his fictional fictitious characters Earnest (actually John and than later Algernon) and Bunbury (a fake invalid for Algernon). This idea was a huge part of the play. The title The Importance of Being Earnest means literally the importance of being serious or sincere which is kind of funny because this play is based on characters that are constantly not being earnest. This idea is most prominently brought to attention in the beginning of the play not even fifteen pages in. Jack, posing as Ernest, explains to Algernon the reasons as to why Jacks lost cigarette case was a present from someone by the name of Cecily. When questioned about Cecily Jack had said he didn’t know anyone by the name. Jack goes on to explain he has created this alter ego (Ernest) in order to protect his dear ward Cecily. Algernon explains he has some experience in what Jack is doing, with his fake friend Bunbury. Algernon explains “you have invented a very useful younger brother called Earnest, in order that you may be able to come up to town as often as you like…” Algernon has proven the point right there. He’s lying to go into town and be himself. Also Algernon has been doing the same thing the whole time. Another instance in which this type of dishonesty is shown is when Jack lies to Gwendolyn about his name because after asking her is she could love anyone with another name he even offers up another solution maybe the name Jack? He asks she replies “Jack? ..... No, there is very little music in the name Jack, if any at all, indeed. It does not thrill. It produces no vibrations…..” So now he’s lying to the girl that is soon to be his wife? What does he expect is going to happen when they actually do get married? The last example of how Wilde portrays this is when Algernon who’s posing Ernest at Jack’s (Ernest’s) house. When Jack confronts Algernon about how terrible he is being and how ungentle man like he is being Algernon says “my duty as a gentleman has never interfered with my pleasures in the smallest degree.” Algernon is clearly saying he’d rather have pleasure than be a gentleman. Also Algernon went to Jack’s house dishonestly posing as Ernest in hopes of courting jacks ward Cecily. In just these two characters we can see Wilde’s way of showing us dishonesty in search of pleasure. These two characters don’t really care who they have to lie too in order to get what they want.

something interesting

The main idea we talked about in our discuccion of the poem "Lobsters" was what the poem ment to us but seeing as everyone is different so we all got different answeres my ideas weren't changed

low diction

This week i took a french test and got a 98% when i told my parents they we're happy but my dad said i could have done better he was only jokin' of course. my mom's still mad that i didn't take spanish. After seeing how much her and my broski faught i'd say i chose the right option. Although french is kinda hard. I have a clarinet lesson tomorrow and i'm not very excited about it.

right now i'm sittin' in front of the compy typin' away about what i did last week and what im doin' now i feel bad for whoever has to read this next 'cause this is super borin' like i'm about to fall asleep this is so borin' what if they had to read like fiftybigillion of these that would be the worst.

extending the theme

The book "To Kill A Mockingbird" by, Harper Lee didn't really speak to me. Except for the part about Boo Radley and how he goes from being the creepy witch that lives at the end of your street to the nice old lady that helped you when you fell off your bike. One other way this book "spoke" to me is when Tom Robinson is wrongfully accused and really the only way this related to me is that it made me remember the many fun times i would get my brother into trouble for "punching" me when really it was just me yelling for my mom so i could watch T.V.

My Boo Radley

When i think about my childhood "Boo Radley" the biggest thing that comes to mind is the garage. I would relate this place too the mysterious Boo Radley of Harper Lee's because from about the ages of three to five the garage has always scared the bejesus out of me. There were no real reasons to hate the dark cold and overall creepy dungeon that is my garage. Could it have been the noises that the monsters made when you weren't looking or the fact that i was three and my imagination got the best of me? (my money's on the monsters.)