The Train

I look down, I see that it’s half past 11. “Oh nugget” I say as I realize my train came at 12:30. I guess I’d have to wait another hour. I’d have to start people watching I suppose. While it has never been my favorite thing to do, I have always tried it when bored. I sat on the bench and prepared for the next hour of my life. As I waited, I saw a train pull up to the station. Everyone had exited the car, except a young man and an older woman.

I saw the train was one that connects to a different station and hopped on. I sat in the car with the man and woman, because it was the one with the least amount of people. They were arguing, but it was too late to move. Too awkward.

“I’M WEARING THIS HAT BECUASE IT IS HOT. WE ARE GOING TO A PLACE WHERE IT IS HOT IF YOU WOULD LOOK AT THE MAP” said the woman. She seemed very crotchety.

“If you would loOK AT THE MAP, you would see that this train is going NORTH. WE GOT ON THE WRONG TRAIN, GRANDMA” yelled the man back at the lady. He was so angry he dropped the box he had clutched to his chest. An insane amount of clothing fell right out of it. Funny, using a box for a suitcase.

I stared out the window and put my headphones in. I didn’t play any music, though, this was sort of interesting. I kept listening to the pair of people bicker and fight, then the train stopped. I got off, walked to the next stop to wait for the upcoming train I could take, then saw the two, grandmother and grandson, go off to find the correct path they were taking. I hope all went well.

Literary Devices

An allusion is a direct or indirect reference to something which is presumably commonly known, such as an event, book, myth, place, or work of art. There multiple allusions found in almost every work of anything. Specifically, in Disney movies, there are a few. In Disney’s Aladdin, there are a few Shakespearean allusions. First, one of the main characters is named Iago. So similar to the Iago from Othello that we just got done reading in class. While the bird Iago in Aladdin isn’t the main person plotting to ruin everyone’s life, he is still evil and wants to make Aladdin’s life back to its miserable ways. Another one in that move is when Aladdin first wishes to be a prince, and the Genie flips through his spell book mumbling things. One of the things he mumbles is “Caesar salad” and an arm, wearing a toga, bursts out of the book with a knife ready to stab someone. The Genie says “Et tu Brute” before shoving the arm back in the book. That is a reference to Julius Ceaser’s last words after he was stabbed by Brutus in Julius Caesar. Also, in Toy Story 3, there’s a scene where the hedgehog and the alien are preforming Romeo and Juliet. Afterwards, the piggy bank and the unicorn are joking about whether they’re going to do Hamlet or Cats next year.

A hamartia is the tragic flaw that leads to the tragic hero’s downfall, or it can also be known as the tragic flaw. In Oedipus, his tragic flaw is considered to be is unintentional wrongdoings. The Oracle tells him he’s going to kill his father and marry his mother, so he leaves where he is from (thinking is “adopted” parents are his real parents) and kills the King of Thebes in a duel to later marry the Queen of Thebes. These people ended up being his actual birth parents that left him on a hill when he was infant because they also heard the prophecy. Another one is in Frankenstein, which I read for my Senior Thesis paper. Victor Frankenstein’s hamartia is considered to be his desire to be an amazing scientist. He tries to create something so wonderful, but is so driven by greatness that he ends up creating a monster. The monster eventually becomes his downfall in the end.

I made all of the conclusions by myself from reading and seeing these things, but here are all the sources for the examples:

Shelley, Mary. Frankestein. Barcelona: Vicens Vives, 2008. Print.

Aladdin. Disney, 1992. Videocassette

Toy Story 3. Disney, 2010. DVD.

“Oedipus.” Oedipus. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 Feb. 2016.

Old Othello

All of these images of the old Othello were really cool. I actually enjoyed Othello and I’m interested to read more of Shakespeare as I get older.

I feel like the main reason the first word of the next page is in the bottom corner is so that the people using the books to act out the play are able to read through it almost flawlessly out loud. It will generally help with the rehearsals. My cousin, who is in theater at her school, says her director gets rather irritated when they’re blocking the play and people keep having to pause while flipping the pages. I’ve even noticed in class with the copies we’ve been reading that students will have a drawn out pause while they are turning the page and it ruins the fluidity of the passages.

I also find it interesting that in some of the versions, all of the names are shortened. I know in class that we would shorten them, but our generation shortens everything so I thought it was just us. We always called Brabantio “Brab” and Desdemona “Des” but I thought that was just because we are lazy. It’s interesting that the original copies have it too. Another thing is that There is such intricate artwork on some of the pages and there’s even this really beautiful calligraphy on the top of each page. It seems like a lot of effort was put into it.

Sarcasm and Puns. My Two Favorite Things

Sarcasm is when people say things that could be serious, but with a tone of jest in their voice. Puns are kind of a play on words. Both sarcasm and puns are used in literature as a sort of comic relief in my opinion. There are actually plenty of puns and sarcastic comments in the Bible that I stumble upon sometimes.

One of my favorite puns is “he had thirty sons who rode around on thirty burrows and lived in thirty boroughs” (Judges 10:4). This is a pun because “burrows” and “boroughs” are pronounced the same, but are very similar. Another good Biblical pun is “you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church” (Matthew 16:18). The name Peter also means rock, and the church Jesus refers to is the people, not a physical building. So in essence, Jesus is saying “‘you are rock and upon this rock I will build you'”. Pretty punny to me.

Sarcasm is also found in the Bible. When Moses is leading the Israelite out of Egypt, one of them looks at him and says “‘Were there no burial places in Egypt that you had to bring us out here to die in the desert?'” (Exodus 14:11). This is extra sarcastic because the Egyptian people were known to have wonderful tombs for their emperors and also tons of graves just around. You can notice that the only people who really use sarcasm are the evil or wrong-doers. I feel like this is because sarcasm is kind of a form of lying when you think about it. That would make it the opposite of what Jesus tells us to do, so most of the people displayed as holy don’t really use sarcasm.

Works Cited: Fireside Catholic Youth Bible: NEXT. Wichita Kansas: DeVore and Sons, 2009. Print.

Hamilton

Recently, I saw the musical “Hamilton” on Broadway. I went with my mother who instantly fell in love with it. She bought the album, and I have started listening to it about as much as her. Overall, I really enjoy this musical.

This album is full of historical facts, fun music, and a great story to follow. With a total of 46 songs, lasting about three hours total, this musical has many different styles of songs. The Congressional Cabinet debates are portrayed as rap battles, while there are emotionally lyrical songs also in the mix. The characters are mainly African American, or simply just not White. This is due to the fact that  Alexander Hamilton was technically an immigrant from an island in the Caribbean. This adds new power, emotion, and a different point of view for the whole musical. Watching the musical on Broadway, I remember the acting being great, and the exciting dance numbers being more energetic than the best high school dance in the history of cheesy high school movies.

Aside from all of the profanity in this musical, which there is plenty of, I would highly recommend this musical to anyone and everyone. It is a really fun way of learning just a little about the Revolutionary period in our country’s history.

Advice

Some of the best advice I’ve ever gotten was from my friends Braden and Ross. I don’t think they meant it as actual advice, but I took it and I keep using it today. I was with them at church one day and complaining about an activity I had to do. It was totally by choice that I did it, but I was complaining all the same. I don’t even remember what I was complaining about. Braden looked at me and said “Mary, if you’re going to complain so much, don’t do it.” Ross then followed up with “Yeah, don’t waste your time doing things you don’t like.” While this piece of advice may seem obvious, it really made me think. Ever since then, I’ve thought about the things I do and my attitude in doing them. If I have to do it, and I hate it, I try really hard not to show that I hate it. If i have the option, and I don’t want to do it, I don’t. I’ve spent most of my life doing things for other people whether or not it’s made me happy, but recently I’ve been changing that. I’ve seen a change in how I treat my family, my friends, and even strangers.

In contrast, some of the worst advice I’ve ever gotten came from my cousin Kelly. She is my life long best friend and we always help each other with anything we need. Usually, her advice is helpful and we get a lot out of talking to each other, but this time, it did not work. I had a crush on a boy a few years ago and I didn’t know how to make him see that I liked him. Kelly said “just tell him”, so I did. I just told the boy. He was not a fan of that and sort of just stopped talking to me. Kelly convinced me that it was all his fault and had nothing to do with me, so she kept telling me to do that and I kept listening. Until last year, I would do that and it never worked. The one time I didn’t just tell the boy I liked him, it worked out pretty fine. This is not to say that that strategy doesn’t work for everyone, but for me, it was horrible.

Blog Assignment Week 10/26

In this interview, Tim O’Brien is talking about his book, The Things They Carried.

In general, this book kind of bothered me, because I felt like all that happened was real, but he tells us it is all fiction. I realize now that he was just telling stories to enable us to see what it could have been like in the war. He said that he wrote his real memoir only seven or eight years after he left the war, but to accomplish his goal for this novel, he had to wait almost 20 years to get his imagination in gear. I think that his goal was met for this novel. He was able to distance himself from the horrors of the war enough to write about it in a way that was not entirely true.

The continued popularity of the book is a surprise to O’Brien. It is speculated that it is partially because of the title. It is able to grasp the audience in and keep us engaged from the start. It’s also interesting that his target audience for this book was really people 25 or older. I, too, am shocked that the general audience that reads this book is high school age kids. If his target audience was seven or eight years older than the high school kids, at minimum, it shows just how intense this book is. It also shows how mature us high schoolers are having to be in order to read this book and fully understand it.

Blog Post Week 10/12

One of my favorites will forever and always be Winnie the Pooh. I have loved reading the books and watching the shows ever since I was a little girl. I have sheets and blankets and pillows and stuffed animals all Winnie the Pooh themed. Once, my friend asked me why I like him so much, and isn’t he really just for little kids? I realized then that not only do I like Winnie the Pooh because hes cute, but because through all of the things he’s said just to Piglet or even Rabbit. One of my favorites is:

“If ever there is tomorrow when we’re not together… there is something you must always remember. You are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think. But the most important thing is, even if we’re apart… I’ll always be with you.”

– A. A. Milne

I feel like Winnie the Pooh has a lot of quotes and things that he says that can be carried into the older years of a person’s life. The small things he does all the time, like eating “hunny” and playing with Piglet are just fun to watch and read about, but when you look back at your childhood love, you see things that you didn’t see before. Things that can apply to your life now, as you are growing up and moving forward to a more independent life. Really, any quote from anything relating to Winnie the Pooh just comforts me and makes me happy, but I keep this one on my mind and in my heart for most of my days.

Blog Assignment Week 10/5

http://www.history.com/topics/vietnam-war/vietnam-war-history 

I knew that the Vietnam war was not a necessarily good war, but I didn’t know all that much about it. The video when you first go to the site gave me a lot of facts that I didn’t know before. For instance, 11,000 of the 2.1 Million soldiers were women, and most of those women were nurses. Personally, I thought that at the time, women were still not allowed to do much. I also found it interesting that in WWII, the average soldier saw 40 days of real combat every four years, whereas the average soldier in the Vietnam War saw 240 days of combat per one year. It can really show how intense this war was and how violent it became.

Reading Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried, has given me some sort of insight as to what happened in the war. Although O’Brien states that none of his stories are actually true, he based the stories off of his time there, so there is some truth behind them. I have learned that this war was particularly scary and gruesome. A fact from the site said that 500,000 of the 3 million troops suffered from some sort of PTSD, which is very scary.

Blog Comments

These are some of my classmate’s blogs that I commented on for the assignment this week. I found both of them interesting and fun to read.

https://schrodingerskittycat.wordpress.com/2015/10/18/a-little-favorite/comment-page-1/#comment-11 

This blog was about his favorite quote. It was “if you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough” said by Albert Einstein. He talked about how this applied to his life in debate and how he can use it in the future.

https://spaghettismoothie.wordpress.com/2015/09/28/birthday/comment-page-1/#comment-23

This entry was about an important thing in history from this person’s birthday. It was fairly interesting and relating to Billy the Kid who I don’t actually know much about.