I have not posted in more than 2 weeks. I've forgotten, procrastinated, and fallen asleep before doing this. This is me writing two weeks worth of blog in less than 20 minutes.
I've been getting really behind on A Tale of Two Cities. Right now, I'm only on chapter 14 in book 2 and should be done with part 2 by now. I think that there are more than 30 chapters in book 2. I need to do some serious reading.
Something that I've noticed is that the book really isn't all that hard to understand. It was a little like understanding Shakespeare for me. I read it, thought about it for a second, and then moved on. I've heard a lot of people say that they have no idea what is going on. These people are either ahead or right where they are supposed to be in reading and maybe that has something to do with it. I don't really understand how others can't understand it. It seems pretty simple to me. There are parts where the wording takes some thought, but they are not very numerous. It just takes a little bit of thinking to figure out what Mr. Dickens is saying.
I've been able to maintain my grades pretty well this term. I've got all A's right now except for an A- in math. It's just barely an A- though and it will probably go up nearer to the end of the term. Geography has been a new class for me this term. I've enjoyed it, and it hasn't been to much of a strain on me. I enjoy being in the class, learning the subjects, and, sometimes, the assignments. Computer Technology has been another new class. It's fun, but I already know most of the stuff that we are learning. I can attribute that to growing up with computers and my dad being a computer person. I'm just doing it because it is required to graduate and I want to get it out of the way.
I just recently got an email from my science teacher with the results for the Science Olympiad competition at Westminster. My partner and I got 1st Compute This! (These events are explained in earlier posts). When we took the test, I had forgotten the paper that is required for each team to participate in an event. While my partner started on the test, I halfway across campus to the gym, where our stuff was, got the paper and ran back. That was kind of annoying, but it surprisingly didn't take too long. My partner had only finished a few questions, so I started making the graphs that were part of the test. We had to use Mac laptops which were a pain. It took so much of our time just figuring the layout of the computer. We didn't know a lot of the commands and where the programs were and had to figure them out. I was really surprised that we were able to finish everything, but, when we were finished, I felt like we had done really well. We actually did do very well,but this competition was just a practice and we weren't able to earn any medals or anything.
For Storm the Castle, we got third. I was okay with that because the competition was run right. The event supervisors were supposed to make a counterweight that fit inside of a 15X15X15 cube. They didn't and the weight was too tall. When our trebuchet fired, the weight hit the bottom of it because we had built it for a 15X15X15 counterweight. I wasn't too worried about this though; it was just a practice competition and what we did didn't change anything.
I wasn't able to get all my blogging in right now, but I will finish it up tomorrow for sure.
Sunday, February 26, 2012
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Act 5, Scene 3: Romeo
How oft when men are at the point of death
Have they been merry? Which their keepers call
A lightning before death: O, how may I
Call this a lightning? -- O my love! My wife!
Death, that hat suck'd the honey of they breath
Hath had no power yet upon thy beauty
Thou art not conquered; Beauty's ensign yet
is crimson in thy lips and in thy cheeks
And death's pale flag is not advanced there
Tybalt, liest thou there in thy bloody sheets?
O, what more favor can I do to thee
Than that hand that hath cut thy youth in twain
To sunder his that was thine enemy?
Forgive me, cousin! -- Ah, dear Juliet,
Why art thou yet so fair? Shall I believe
That unsubstantial death is amorous;
And that the lean abhorred monster keeps
Thee here in the dark to be his paramour?
For fear of that I still will stay with thee,
And never from this palace of dim night
Depart again: here, here I will remain
With worms that are thy chambermaids: O, here
Will I set up my everlasting rest;
And shake the yoke of inauspicious stars
From this world-wearied flesh. --Eyes, look your last!
Arms, take your last embrace? and, lips, O you
The doors of breath, seal with a righteous kiss
A dateless bargain to engrossing death!--
Come, bitter conduct, come, unsavoury guide!
Thou desperate pilot, now at once run on
The dashing rocks thy sea-sick weary bark!
Here's to my love!-- O true apothecary!
Thy drugs are quick. --Thus with a kiss I die.
Have they been merry? Which their keepers call
A lightning before death: O, how may I
Call this a lightning? -- O my love! My wife!
Death, that hat suck'd the honey of they breath
Hath had no power yet upon thy beauty
Thou art not conquered; Beauty's ensign yet
is crimson in thy lips and in thy cheeks
And death's pale flag is not advanced there
Tybalt, liest thou there in thy bloody sheets?
O, what more favor can I do to thee
Than that hand that hath cut thy youth in twain
To sunder his that was thine enemy?
Forgive me, cousin! -- Ah, dear Juliet,
Why art thou yet so fair? Shall I believe
That unsubstantial death is amorous;
And that the lean abhorred monster keeps
Thee here in the dark to be his paramour?
For fear of that I still will stay with thee,
And never from this palace of dim night
Depart again: here, here I will remain
With worms that are thy chambermaids: O, here
Will I set up my everlasting rest;
And shake the yoke of inauspicious stars
From this world-wearied flesh. --Eyes, look your last!
Arms, take your last embrace? and, lips, O you
The doors of breath, seal with a righteous kiss
A dateless bargain to engrossing death!--
Come, bitter conduct, come, unsavoury guide!
Thou desperate pilot, now at once run on
The dashing rocks thy sea-sick weary bark!
Here's to my love!-- O true apothecary!
Thy drugs are quick. --Thus with a kiss I die.
Sunday, February 5, 2012
Science Olympiad
Yesterday (Saturday), I went to the District competition for Science Olympiad. At, this I competed in 2 of my 3 events; I competed in Compute This! and Storm the Castle.
My partner and I won first place in Storm the Castle, but it wasn't because our machine was better than any other. It was because we had graphs showing how to use it. You get scored on how well the trebuchet does, but almost half the points are in the graphs. We were the only team at District to actually have those graphs, but I expect we'll see more prepared teams at the State competition. In order for us to do well there, we're going to have to build a better machine. We need one that throws more than twice as far as the one we have now which will be quite difficult seeing as how the one we have now was already difficult to figure out how to build. At the District competition, we could have also done a little better. My partner looked at the graphs wrong when we were setting up the target and didn't put it far enough out. We missed both times and I didn't notice his error until after the first shot. I looked at the graph that he had made and was immediately lost. It took awhile to figure out what his graph meant. I think that I need to do the graph next time. We won, but we could have done better.
There were a lot of problems with Compute This!. The first one involves my partner. He doesn't like me giving him advice while he works. He finds it annoying even though he does the exact same thing when it's my turn to work. I don't say anything when he annoys me though. It's frustrating sometimes to do this event with him. Another problem was that the test was not written right. In the rules it states that there can be up to 5 questions and 1 graph. The test at District had 10 questions and with the way they had worded it, 5 graphs. Afterwords, they told us that they intended for there only to be 1 graph, but it was worded poorly. The guy who had written the test had never done it before. I was ticked off about that. We got second place because we were not able to answer the last few questions because it took me so long to change the graph into 5 separate data tables and graphs. I did that because I was following the instructions exactly. We got full points on the graph.
Overall, I think that we did pretty good. At the District level, they don't announce school winners because it's more of a practice competition. We do it to prepare ourselves for the next upcoming competitions. We only received photocopy certificates, but we will be able to earn medals at Regionals and also at State. I've got a lot of work to do involving the building events: Storm the Castle and Mission Possible.
My partner and I won first place in Storm the Castle, but it wasn't because our machine was better than any other. It was because we had graphs showing how to use it. You get scored on how well the trebuchet does, but almost half the points are in the graphs. We were the only team at District to actually have those graphs, but I expect we'll see more prepared teams at the State competition. In order for us to do well there, we're going to have to build a better machine. We need one that throws more than twice as far as the one we have now which will be quite difficult seeing as how the one we have now was already difficult to figure out how to build. At the District competition, we could have also done a little better. My partner looked at the graphs wrong when we were setting up the target and didn't put it far enough out. We missed both times and I didn't notice his error until after the first shot. I looked at the graph that he had made and was immediately lost. It took awhile to figure out what his graph meant. I think that I need to do the graph next time. We won, but we could have done better.
There were a lot of problems with Compute This!. The first one involves my partner. He doesn't like me giving him advice while he works. He finds it annoying even though he does the exact same thing when it's my turn to work. I don't say anything when he annoys me though. It's frustrating sometimes to do this event with him. Another problem was that the test was not written right. In the rules it states that there can be up to 5 questions and 1 graph. The test at District had 10 questions and with the way they had worded it, 5 graphs. Afterwords, they told us that they intended for there only to be 1 graph, but it was worded poorly. The guy who had written the test had never done it before. I was ticked off about that. We got second place because we were not able to answer the last few questions because it took me so long to change the graph into 5 separate data tables and graphs. I did that because I was following the instructions exactly. We got full points on the graph.
Overall, I think that we did pretty good. At the District level, they don't announce school winners because it's more of a practice competition. We do it to prepare ourselves for the next upcoming competitions. We only received photocopy certificates, but we will be able to earn medals at Regionals and also at State. I've got a lot of work to do involving the building events: Storm the Castle and Mission Possible.
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