Impromptu speech day!

Today I got in my car and I went to college. Classes went fine. After classes are over I was walking to my car when I noticed some kind of jerk parked super close to my car door. All I can say is, Jerk. Anyways, I was trying to squeeze into my car, without letting my door hit the neighboring jerk-mobile, when I hear my name being called. I looked up and there was Mr.Paulson. And Mr. Paulson told me to blog about todays speech events.  My first thought was, ‘I didn’t know he knew about my blog.” My second thought was, “Yes! I’ll do it.”
    So here I am. Blogging. About impromptu speech day.

Class started with Mr. Paulson walking in. With a box full of random objects. Everyone knew what was happening. We were going to give an impromptu speech.  This video helps explains it all:

Yes, we had to create an infomercial with whatever he gave us. Luckily we got put into groups. I don’t think I could have done it alone. 
 

The various infomercials included a product for balding, some kind of intelligence enhancer, a program for creating the perfect basketball shot,  a “swiss army” shelf, and a surprise guest appearence by Billy Mays.
For our props we were given a stapler, a roll of ribbon, a balloon, a mini basketball, a small cassette, and a metal strip.
We were chosen to go first. Our product? The Non-Pants on the Ground Project. There are three steps to the Project. First we must decide how severe your problem is. Then we must implement a solution. Then you can live hapily ever after without your pants on the ground.
The three levels are:
1) Moderately baggy. With slight undie showage.
2) Super baggy. With massive undie showage.
3) No Hope.

To solve the first level we give you a balloon and some ribbon, to tie the balloon to your pants. Then the balloon will just float and hold your pants.

The second stage is solved by stapling your pants to your shirt.

If you’ve entered the third stage there is obviously no hope for you. We give you the mini basketball to use as a stress ball.

Remember to get your own versiou of the Non-Pants on the Ground Project. That way you won’t look like a fool, with you pants on the ground (See video below).

I feel pretty good about it all.  Class was amazingly fun today.

Ick, The Sequel

Woke up sicker today. First day of back after spring break. I feel all nauseous when I stand up or walk around. I feel bad for it, but I didn’t go to my British literature class this morning. I’m trying to send the teacher an email, but my internet connection must be slow. It’s taking forever.
When I went into my student account, to send out an email, apologizing for being sick, I noticed another email.
My speech teacher is sick too. Which means I dont’ have a class until 2 today. Pretty lucky. Plenty of time to veg out and to feel better.

Ick.

It’s the sunday before college starts again. Guess who’s getting sick? Me. My throat is all nasty and feels swollen. Ick. I hope I can fight it off. We’re starting a new chapter in my College Algebra class tomorrow, and I don’t want to miss it. I have a hard enough time keeping up even now, when I’ve been in class every day.

Well, this has technically been my first spring break. It wasn’t overly amazing. Did I do it wrong? TV always makes it so glamorized. I just sat around playing games and not doing school work. It felt good when I didn’t have to drag myself out of bed for classes. But it wasn’t spectacular. Even the weather wasn’t spectacular. It’s all wet and icky outside. Mud. I did make a snowman last weekend. It’s melted already. I made it with my little cousin. We named him.. Cloudy? Yeah, I guess so. And we did use colored water to make him more…bright?

Cloudy and Christopher.

This was not Cloudy at his colorfullness. First he was purple, then we added some red. Then some blue. And then some yellow. By the end he looked pretty awkward. But it was fun all the same. Christopher is my little cousin.

   This doesn’t count for spring break, but last Wednesday, I had a Tae Kwon Do test. I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned it on here, but I’ve been in Tae Kwon Do for about two years. I tested last week for my Brown Trim belt. I passed.  It always makes me feel good when I pass.  So lets see. How many belts until I’m a black belt? Red belt, then red trim…Then I get to test for my blackbelt. So… Two? Two more regular tests, then my blackbelt test. Wow. Pretty… nerve inducing.

My TKD instructor is currently building us a new gym to train in. It’s that dome thing, between the bowling alley and the Best Western. He isn’t hiring many professionals to help build it. He ordered the plan and the wood and we put up the wood structure ourselves. A lot of the older students and the younger students parents have been helping. I was out there a bit last summer. Well now that it’s warming up, we’re going to be getting back at it. So later today I’ll be out there, in the mud, helping with whatever needs to get done. And we’ve all been doing a great job, but he’s sacrificed quite a bit for it himself.

At our testing, last wedensday, I was given the job to inform everyone about his sacrifice. So here it goes: Our instructor is Mike Perish. He’s currently a Third Degree black belt. However, he has technically sacrificed his fourth degree test for our gym and our training. He’s put so much time and effort into the gym, for us. And instead of testing for his fourth degree last november (because he was supposed to test this most recent november) he has decided to wait until the gym is done to test. I think the rumors are that once it’s finished, He’s going to hold an open testing, inviting the public to watch. Usually blackbelt tests are secret, and only blackbelts can watch them. So this is a pretty big deal.

Speech writing… kinda….

I am currently asking myself what I am doing in this speech class.  The reason? I’m currently writing a speech.
Well finishing it up, at least. I have to present it tomorrow. I must say I feel it’s turing out quite well. I guess I’ve always felt I’m good at writing the speeches, but I can’t perform them. I get too nervous. I can’t seem to make it flow, in front of an audience.

Writing this speech has put me in the mood for some creative writing. Maybe I’ll post some of my old stories and poems from Senior year on here. Would anyone actually read them? Perhaps I’ll take a chance.

When We Two Parted

Just finished writing my first draft for my British Literature paper. It’s an analysis of a poem from the romantic period. I wrote mine on When We Two Parted, by Lord Byron.

When we two are parted
Lord Byron

When we two parted
In silence and tears,
Half broken-hearted,
To sever for years,
Pale grew thy cheek and cold,
Colder thy kiss;
Truly that hour foretold
Sorrow to this.

The dew of the morning
Sank chill on my brow
It felt like the warning
Of what I feel now.
Thy vows are all broken,
And light is thy fame:
I hear thy name spoken,
And share in its shame.

They name thee before me,
A knell to mine ear;
A shudder comes o’er me
Why wert thou so dear?
They know not I knew thee,
Who knew thee too well:
Long, long shall I rue thee
Too deeply to tell.

In secret we met
In silence I grieve
That thy heart could forget,
Thy spirit deceive.
If I should meet thee
After long years,
How should I greet thee?
With silence and tears.

Just amazing, Isn’t it?

So I just spent an hour shoveling snow. You know, undoing what the snowplow did. I appreciate them clearing the roads. I don’t appreciate it all getting shoved in our driveway. I guess they can’t really control it. And it was a great workout. Nice way to start my day.

You know they had to snowplow becuase it snowed. Which goes hand in hand with what’s going on this week at Northland College. It’s Snow fest week. Activities are…

Monday- Movie night. Zombieland at 7.
Tuesday- Rock n Bowl. Starts 9:30 at the Bowling alley.
Wednesday- Basketball games at 6 and 8
Thursday- Sweetheart dance starting at 9 in the commons.

I hope everyone has fun. I’m going to mosey my way on down to the Basketball games and take some pictures. I’ll post them here so you all can see.

Also, we don’t have school on Monday due to it being presidents day. Yet another reason to thank our past and present leaders.

If Only...

Wouldn’t it be awesome if this was true? I’d ace my Algebra class or at least get kicked out for trying to argue my point. I’d just tell my teacher that he’s doing it wrong.

I sit here, checking D2L every 10 minutes, just waiting for my grades to be up. You see, I took my first test in my College Algebra class yesterday. My teacher promised to have grades up sometime around/after 3 today. So here I sit, checking D2L every few mintues. Waiting and waiting and waiting.

It sure is cold out. Anyone else happy for the snow day on monday? I was. I can’t even begin to tell you how hard I was hoping for a snow day. And then it happened. Amazing. I went back to bed of course, but still. It’s the thought that counts.

Today was pretty awesome. Since last week was the beginning of the new semester, things have been rather busy. I now have a math class, which I suck at. I’ve never been very good at math. This is probably the class I am most worried about. We’ve been moving so fast. I’ve been able to keep up but barely. Then today, in my Into to Public Speaking class we took this anxiety quiz thing. I scored 112. Which means I’m in the Moderatly High section for being afraid of public speaking. I also had to give my first mini speech thing today. It was a pretty cool assignment though. We were paired up with a student in the class, randomly, and we had to interview them. Then we wrote a minute long speech and introduced our partner to the class. It’s a good way of getting acclimated to the class along with getting to know your classmates. Remember how I got that 112 score? It was all to apparent when I gave my speech. Once I stood up, my face started getting warm. I could only imagine how red it was during the course of my speech. My voice started shaking, I couldn’t look up from my paper. I was so frustrated! I’ve had a speech class before, I did great in it. Why did I falter this time around? Well anyway…

I was skeptical at first, about my Developmental Psychology class. I wasn’t sure I was going to like it at all, when I started it last week. But today, I realized how amazing it is. We started out learning about Prenatal Development. We learned about these things called teratogens, which are drugs or diseases that cause harm to an unborn baby. You know, like a mom doing cocaine or having an STD while pregnant and how it affects the baby. Even something as simple as drinking caffeine while pregnant can harm a baby. We watched a video on the effects of drinking during pregnancy and how it can cause Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. I found it absoluetly fascinating. Just crazy. Maybe I’ll go into details later but all of the symptoms that a child has from Fetal Alcohol Syndrome are just interesting to me. Is that morbid in a sense? I’m not sure.
To top everything off, I got sick last thursday night and didn’t go to class on Friday. Instead I spent my day in the clinic as I magically got an appointment with some Nurse Practitioner. I waited for 20 minutes before I was called into the room. Then the nurse took my temp, blood pressure. All that usual stuff. She swabbed my throat for a Strep Test and left. She came back later, to bring me a blanket and some orange juice. I tell you, it was good orange juice. So anyways, I fell asleep on the examining table. I never really fell asleep, but I was pretty out of it, drifting in and out for awhile and when I sat up to check the time I noticed that 40 minutes had gone by. I had been in the room for 40 mintues. So I sat there for a while more, before anyone noticed I was there. Turns out It was just a Viral thing. That didn’t solve the fact that I felt crappy all weekend. What a great way to start off my second semester of college.