Phew, the end of an era. Genius hour is done with and here was the visual for the presentation I gave, Although most of the information is supposed to be spoken.
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Who doesn't know the frustration of writing paper, either finding the time for multiple days to work on it, getting the paper just right or that rush after having procrastinated for days maybe even a couple weeks to be able to turn in something that is a viable paper in theory only. After this recent paper i had to do for rhetoric though I wasn't as frustrated though (I used more of that first option then normal in writing). We had more than enough time to write, I think I spent like 24 hours on the paper (Probably more like 10 actually working, Netflix can be distracting) and it made easy not to feel stressed out. I did my paper on sugar and it's effects on the body, but this also blended into the affects of artificial sweeteners on the body. I learned that sugar, although is tasty and adds to flavor of foods, can be pretty bad for us. Sugar can cause some heart disease just like the fat and sugar also leads to obesity and type 2 diabetes. Sweeteners aren't much better either, many have a chance of causing cancer.
The most difficult part of the paper? Being forced to take notes on sources and grabbing more sources then I actually needed. I don't actually take physical notes for sources I just sort of look at what I can use from that specific source and remember where the helpful parts are. Then having to scrape the bottom of the barrel for sources that actually work is a horrible time, there is lots of information on sugar being bad for people, but not actually that much that is actually information people might not know or was actually useful. The easiest was having things to write about. With 10 sources on my topic, each about different parts of the topic there was a lot to use. I did find myself using some sources a lot more than others, like the movie, but those sources had so much more information really making those 6 extra sources useless. I like the paper I wrote. I put a lot of effort into it and am proud of it. I'd give it a B, it's not the best but still pretty good. Given another week I might be able to meet my own expectations by fixing the wording of some parts and explaining a little more. I'd also collaborate with people a little more, see what they think I should add or they feel I've left in the argument as a whole. [Photo, Frustration (was: threesixtyfive | day 244) by Sybren Stüvel, licensed under creative commons 2.0] [Photo, Sugar by Moyan Brenn, licensed under creative commons 2.0] Food additives have been a topic for debate for a long time. First here was the problem of fat as an additive. Fat increased the risk for heart disease, but once it was taken out of food the public thought food was bland. So what’s a better alternative? Companies switched to sugar as their alternative, slapped low fat on the label, and sales skyrocketed. However recent studies have shown that sugar may not be the better alternative. Some researchers have gone so far as to say that sugar is toxic and artificial sweeteners aren’t any better. I first heard about this topic through a YouTube video on how sugar is bad for human consumption. The topic has interested me since because it suggests that sugar feeds a yeast in the human stomach that helps cause people to crave more sugary foods and starts to cause digestive problems. Then learning about the addictive properties of sugar I became increasingly interested in the topic. In this paper I will argue that perhaps the best way for food to be sold is without any additives rather than putting unneeded sugars in food. There is already a combination of molecules in foods disrupting the combination of molecules could make it more difficult on the body to digest. I won’t be focusing on the yeast that causes problems, but I will explore what it is and what it does to the body. I won‘t be focusing on the cost of food without sugar additives or things like that, but I will be exploring artificial sweeteners and whether they are a healthy alternative to sugars. Although I will explore alternatives to sugar or ways to circumvent the sugar problem that seems to arise, however this won’t be a focus of the paper either. There are a couple perspectives to this topic such as the sugar companies, scientists, and the consumer. The sugar companies have to make money and push their product through. If food doesn’t use their sugars their going to lose money. However, that doesn’t mean that food producers have to put sugars in so many things they sell using the fact that sugar is literally addictive to sell product. The scientific point of view is that sugar has been shown to cause problems in the G.I. tract giving more than enough reason for an alternative to be found. Consumers have a variety of viewpoints. They want good tasting food but they also have to have it healthy. Some would sacrifice in either area to make a gain in the other. The government has to have the viewpoint of how to protect its citizens and ensure that they are remaining healthy as a priority when it comes to their food. Lectures and recent studies on sugar as well as some older studies will be helpful to me. There may be documentaries or YouTube videos on the subject as well. If possible I could interview someone who has researched sugar. However, it would much easier to conduct a survey then an interview. I’d need to find a baseline knowledge of sugar and then perhaps seeing if a number of people have symptoms of lots of additive sugars in foods as well as finding out if they are eating a lot of these foods. After researching further I could add questions about artificial sweeteners and perhaps the yeast that can hijack the G.I. tract. The survey won’t become the focal point of the survey, but I will use information from it to find a new direction in the paper or as back up for points from other sources. The majority of sources I’ve found have talked against refined sugar. I’ve found a summary on the lecture of a professor who’s been studying the effects of refined sugar on the body and who has labeled it as toxic for the body. Similarly, I‘ve found an excerpt on a book all about the effects of sugar on people and animals from 1975 that considers refined sugar a poison due to the fact that it can actually leech nutrients from the body. The abstract of a research project crucifies sugar as a toxin and I can use the YouTube video in finding more sources as well as things to look into for my research. The video has also showed me I need to find out more on the yeast as well. I’m searching for a documentary that may help me as well. There doesn’t seem to be any back and forth the sources I’ve found are pretty polarized to saying that refined sugar is bad for people to consume. Some of my friends and I went to Buffalo Wild Wings located at 1023 Brookforest Dr in Shorewood, Il to eat and I wasn't super impressed with their service, but I can say that they make up for it in different aspects of their experience. First is their curb appeal and you really can't miss the signs to the restaurant. It's clearly Buffalo Wild Wings you're headed to, but it's in a strip mall with no definite parking areas so a lot of spaces are taken up. Add that to the fact that it's a pretty busy place and it's easy to understand why you might have to park on the other side of the strip mall. For curb appeal I would say they earn a B+ because they don't really stand out but the restaurant isn't bad looking either. However, that doesn't take away from the experience though because once you walk in the restaurant, the atmosphere hits you. It just feels like a place to go hangout and they manage the cramped little space they have well. There are definite walk ways that have a wide area to walk through compared to other areas with the tables much closer together. They keep the atmosphere comfortable and close without making you feel smothered by others, A-. After everyone was seated and ready to go our waitress got to us pretty fast. This agreed to by my friend Grant, "[t]he waitress early was on top of everything..." Although she was kind of rude at that point rushing us for drinks, but it only took her one minute and 31 seconds to get all of our drinks which was great. After she gave our drinks though her attitude changed (this might be because she noticed us writing in notebooks) and she was less rude. However, even though it was a busy Friday night, something that is astounding to me, is the fact that after the first drink was finished it was eleven minutes and fifty-three seconds before we had to ASK for our drinks to be refilled. Our waitress rarely came to our table to check if we needed anything. Again it was a busy night which has to be taken into account, but still it's pretty inexcusable. However, they were pretty fast at getting all the food out, it took 5 minutes 53 seconds for the fried pickles and 7 minutes 8 seconds after for the meal. With that said and taking into account it was a busy night, B- for service. The menu has a very good layout and it's easy to find everything.... except soft drink prices. All of the drinks are on the back of the menu and no one could find them immediately. The food is arranged very well though as well as the sauces. We each ordered some wings to test them out all over their spiciness range. Easy to find the sides and appetizers, sandwiches, burgers, wraps, desserts, all simplicity itself. For the menu layout an A. So now the real evaluation: the food. Personally, I'm a fan of fried pickles, but the pickles I had that night weren't terrible, but definitely not the best either, B-. Pretty mediocre actually. I ordered the buffalo rub and it was a nice new flavor. It had a spicy flavor but wasn't overpowering and added a great savory taste to the chicken, A. My personal favorite at Buffalo Wild Wings is a great mixture of spicy and sweet in a sauce. Neither overpowering the other in great balance A-. However a new favorite of mine is the Caribbean jerk. It is extremely sweet but finishes with a subtly spicy after taste and was a nice change of pace, A. The opposite of this? The spicy garlic and is still a great new flavor. It has an immediate kick and a savory taste, although it's almost overpowered by the spice, B+. The mild is not very impressive though. It has all the spice of the spicy garlic with none of the flavor, C+. The last flavor I tried was the hot bbq and it wasn't super impressive either, slightly sweet with a lotta kick but not very memorable for me, B. Overall the food comes to a B+.
They give a lot of things to do while you eat: watch the game, play poker using buzztime or trivia. All in all it's a nice hangout spot and my drink, appetizer, buffalo and honey bbq wings cost only $25.14 and was pretty filling. A good experience and for the right price. Overall I'd give the restaurant an A-. If you want to check out some other takes on the meal checkout Grant's, Dallas', Elmer's, or Stephen's blogs. I watched a review of the Ill Mind of Hopsin 7 by Hopsin, which you can watch below, by Anthony Fantano today and I'm not sure how I feel about it. How he judges the song seems really lopsided. When I think about a good rap song, a powerful rap song I think of 4 things: the flow, the beat, the emotion behind the rap, and what the rap says In equal parts. And Fantano addresses each of these but he spends A LOT of time on what Hopsin is talking about. He does mention briefly all the other parts of the song saying that Hopsin "has flow" and that the beat is great. He notes that Hopsin seems to be "a disciple of Eminem" with the emotion he puts behind his words. But then he focuses on the words of the song and seems to tear at Hopsin's verse, saying that it's juvenile and doesn't say as much as he wants it too. But he goes on a long tangent and doesn't make a real point as to why Hop's words are wrong, merely stretching a debate. Fantano doesn't effectively judge the words because he doesn't evaluate all the pieces together, he talks around his point and doesn't address the song itself. His neglect of taking the beat and flow into as much account and barely making the emotion known makes his review of Hopsin's song not the best. [Photo, KOALA DEL RAP! by telly gacitua, licensed under creative commons 2.0] [Photo, Détail de "Blah, blah, blah" du studio Louise Campbell (Maison du Danemark) by Jean-Pierre Dalbéra, licensed under creative commons 2.0] I remixed my literary analysis paper on The Tell-Tale Heart by making, or in essence at the moment attempting to make a film of the story. My favorite part of the project is definitely Ulysses' acting because he was really into it where I was not so much in this take. I made the script trying to change and use phrases in TTTH to show what I meant in my paper, we filmed the video with my Ipod recorded audio using audacity and then I started to edit. However, the video of the movie crapped out on us in editing, neither of us could recover it so the semi-finished project is just audio. We're going to redo the video and hopefully get a better finished project just for ourselves. As it is the audio works more as a loose audiobook of TTTH than as an actual video, but I still think it conveys that the man is crazy, he doesn't hate the old man (in the story), and his real problem is the eye not so much anything else until he associates it with the eye. I think anyone who enjoyed TTTH would think it works well as a form of the story. My purpose in making the film was to prove the point of my paper and to make a good thriller skit, that may not have gone so well. [Photo, Blue Eyed Boy by V, licensed under creative commons 2.0]
[Photo, sad face by ijustwanttobeperceivedthewayiam, licensed under creative commons 2.0]
Earlier this year I wrote a narrative on part of my life and as a story I'd say the essay works fairly well. Transitioning in this paper was not my forte and my vocab was not the most awe inspiring. It seems pretty rushed to me and the word choice feels awkward to me. I know I didn't really consider any argument or making an argument and I think I probably would have changed how I wrote the narrative, maybe more to argue for kids to not bully others or for adults to work harder to stop it.
Been a while without a post for an update so lets seee
We haven't done a podcast in a while just because we've been writing scripts in study hall. The first skit we're going to do is going to be a short rework of The Tell-Tale Heart by Poe. That's just because it happens to go with the remix project in rhetoric. Well til next time or next podcast. [Photo, Edgar Allen Poe - The Raven by Ian Burt, licensed under creative commons 2.0] I recently signed a petition to save net neutrality and although this topic is important to everyone, people know shockingly little about it. Net Neutrality is the term used for setting up a set of laws to regulate the internet. Now the name and what it's doing are an oxymoron. Net neutrality seems like it's going against what it wants, an open and free internet, But that's what Internet Service Providers want. The regulations in net neutrality don't affect consumers directly, they affect the ISPs. ISPs want to be able to make Internet fast lanes that content creators would have to pay for to get their content to consumers faster This isn't how the internet should be! How are people supposed to make new things and get started if people can't get their products! It's important that net neutrality laws get passed to protect free and unhindered flow of information. [Photo, Free Wireless Internet by Wesley Fryer, licensed under creative commons 2.0]
[Photo, Slow by elycefeliz , licensed under creative commons 2.0] |