i had to type these for english class...just another way of gettin my views out i suppose...so here it is:
1. I am a big fan of football. Professional, college, or high school, I always thoroughly enjoy a good game of football. Some of my best art are offensive football plays I have devised. I send out weekly e-mails with my predictions for National Football League games to some of my friends, because that is another thing I enjoy to do concerning football. My favorite professional team is the Tennessee Titans, while I root for the University of Tennessee on the college gridiron and Hendersonville and Station Camp High Schools in their respective divisions.
2. My second favorite sport is basketball. I mainly like college and high school basketball, although I sometimes attend church league games and will occasionally watch a professional game. One of the reasons I am so fond of high school basketball is because I am a statistician for Merrol Hyde’s team. I also really enjoy the atmosphere surrounding the game of college basketball, especially surrounding the national tournament. My take on professional basketball players is that they are a bunch of jerks playing for the name on the back of their jersey instead of the one on the front, which is why I prefer high school and college ball better.
3. I am also a fanatic for baseball. However, unlike basketball or football, I concentrate solely on professional baseball. My favorite teams are the Boston Red Sox in the American League and the Chicago Cubs in the National League. If I had to pick between the two teams and leagues, though, I would go with the Red Sox and the American. My favorite time of year in baseball is October, especially when one of my teams is in Championship contention. October is the month in which the World Series is played. The thing I dislike the most about baseball is the steroids scandal. Despite the drugs, though, baseball still remains a pastime for me.
4. Two common breakfast foods are waffles and pancakes. While they have many similarities, the two menu staples have their differences. Thanks to these differences, one can determine which is better. Waffles can be square or round, while pancakes are normally just round. In contrast to the flatness of pancakes, waffles have grooves in them, which is better for syrup lovers. Waffles, with their grooves and ridges, are better capable of holding more syrup, but because of pancakes’ flatness, it’s not so easy for them to hold syrup. Therefore, I have come to the conclusion that waffles are better than pancakes.
5. In this year’s highly publicized presidential election, the Democrats have nominated Illinois Senator Barack Obama, who is running with Delaware Senator Joe Biden as his vice-presidential candidate. I highly respect, and even somewhat envy, Senator Obama’s speech-giving capabilities, but I’m not sure if I agree with all of his views, nor am I sure if he will be able to deliver on his promises. On the Republican ticket, Arizona Senator John McCain is running alongside of his vice-presidential candidate, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin. I am very intrigued by this election, and I am of now undecided. One thing is for sure, the road to Washington is a long and hard one for both parties, and whoever wins the election will be the President, and I will respect that person as such.
6. So far this has been a good school year for me. The classes I am in are English 1010, Chemistry, Interactive Multimedia, and Band. I am not failing any of my classes as of yet, and do not plan to be failing at any point in the year. Among the extracurricular activities I am involved in are Fellowship of Christian Athletes, Flight Club, the high school men’s basketball team, and, once the first meeting has begun, the Junior Classical League. I do not actually play basketball, but because I’m the statistician I am a part of the team nonetheless. I play alto saxophone in the high school symphonic band, and I am also in jazz band.
7. The smell of popcorn. The sound of a foghorn celebrating the readjustment of score. Thousands of fans wanting to get back quickly to the stands to cheer on their Vanderbilt Commodores as they manhandle the University of South Carolina. These are just a few of the many variables that go into working the concession stands at Vanderbilt. On Thursday, August 4, as I have been the last five years, I was privileged enough to be a part of a twelve-man team working concessions for the Commodores game. The experience is a very rewarding one, because it teaches many cooperation, communication, and time management skills. I have thoroughly enjoyed every game I have been a part of, especially when my team gets the win.
8. One of my newer hobbies is photography. I enjoy taking pictures of anything possible. Right now I have a decent point-and-shoot camera, but I want a more professional camera to take my photos with. My favorite things to photograph are sunsets, sunrises, and people. There is a group at my Church devoted to the arts, and our original division was photography. I think being involved in this group got me really interested and started on my new hobby.
9. I am an active member of my Scout Troop. I am just about to earn my Life rank, which is the rank before Eagle. I am also Assistant Senior Patrol Leader, which puts me as second in command of my entire troop. Last weekend we went on a canoe trip. I was acting Senior Patrol Leader during the trip, and I felt it was a very successful weekend for the troop, with only a few minor setbacks. I’ve learned a lot of things through Scouts, including cooking, camping, and communication skills, which I will use for the rest of my life.
10. I am also extremely actively involved in my Church community. I sing in the youth choir and I also am a part of just about every youth activity that one can be involved in. We go on about six trips a year, four or five of them in the summer alone. Among the highlights of each year are our Choir Tour; Warmth in Winter, a conference-wide event; two missions experiences; and a mystery trip, which we ideally do not know the destination of until the morning we leave. I would definitely not give up my experience with my Church for anything.
11. In Multimedia today, we did a group project. This project involved taking a picture of a silhouette in which every member of the group was a piece of. We had a very challenging time discerning what we were going to be and how we were going to make it. Our idea heading out of the planning stage Thursday was to create a whale, but after having a night to think it over, we decided that the difficulty level was too high for our lack of experience. Our next idea was a “human spider,” with each team member’s arms stretched out to create the effect of one person with a multitude of limbs. After a try or two of this idea, we realized that it was too cramped for seven of us to line up in a single file line, in addition to the different body sizes. In the way the picture was set up, there was a floodlight and a white cloth, and the object was supposed to be between the sheet and the light. We were set up in the downstairs hallway where the bathrooms and guidance office are. For our third idea, we tired to make the standard human pyramid. For some reason which I will never understand, someone suggested that I should be on top of the pyramid. So, consenting, and without warning, I leapt off a chair onto the top of the pile, and it immediately collapsed. We tried twice more with me on top, but the pyramid did not last with me on top, even with prior warning of my moving to the top, so we repositioned people, and on the second try of this new arrangement, we succeeded in taking a picture. The picture resembled a giant block with a human trying to catch her balance. We then determined that we were in too close a space to take any good pictures, so we went to the other side of the cloth and began taking pictures from the other side. Our lighting was much better. We then tried the human spider again and a flower, and kept failing miserably. By this time much of the group was starting to get frustrated. After some minor adjustments and much groaning, we tried one last time. This time we took the form of a tree. It was the best picture we had taken the entire day, so we cleaned up and put everything back in place. Granted, it wasn’t professional, but it should be good enough to earn a passing grade. Some of the characteristics we found that we needed to work on as a group were cooperation, planning, communication, and tolerance. As a whole, the project was most successful as a learning experience.
12. There have been three major tropical systems that have been in the news in the past two weeks. The first one, Hurricane Gustav, made landfall on Labor Day some seventy miles to the southwest of New Orleans as a Category Two storm. Hurricane Hanna had downsized to a Tropical Storm by the time it hit the Carolina Coast on the fifth of September. Hurricane Ike, a Category Three storm, is currently moving north of the island of Hispaniola, and is slated to pass over the Bahamas on its way to making landfall somewhere along the gulf coast by Sunday the fifteenth. Ike is most likely the worst of the three storms, and could wreak extreme havoc, bringing back memories of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, especially if it has time to grow before hitting the States. Residents are advised to take cover and prepare for the storm, especially when a landfall date and area are more specifically known, typically about two or three days before the storm hits. For large, potentially deadly storms, citizens are urged to leave everything behind but the essentials and their valued possessions, and evacuate. Refugees are scattered all over landlocked states when the hurricane hits, and, depending on how bad the damage is, go back home in anywhere from a day to three months after the storm makes landfall. Hurricanes are dangerous storms, and are not to be messed with.
