The librarys full

Its dead day, and the library is so close to being full its unreal. Its not surprising that there are no study rooms available, but its pretty crazy that nearly every little workstation thing is taken. There are spots open yeah, but only a few in the middle of a group of people and not off in a nook somewhere where its real quiet. I should come up with a place to study at thats free of distractions but that's not the library. I don't know where to find that, anyone know?

Journal 7

Over the course of this entire semester, I have learned many critical skills that are beneficial to myself as a writer. Towards the beginning of the semester, I had just learned simple skills such as analysis of subjects, and dissecting papers. Since then, I have gained the necessary skills to critically analyze a piece of writing, then dissect it's contents, and figure out the who, when, where, and why pertaining to the subject.

Such skills have allowed me to break down the components of a speech, break down and assess the validity of points in a public argument, and even use that knowledge to write my own public discourse. These are some of the most fundamental skills I have picked up over the course of this semester.

In addition to this, I have picked up many beneficial little skills along the way that help to increase the performance of my writing. I have learned to revise, revise, and do some more revising. Revisions have become a key part of writing good papers for me, going back on my thoughts from days or weeks prior allows me to have a full scope of how I want to write my paper and use idea that may not have come to me in the first few revisions of my paper.

The five pieces of advice I would give;

1. Pay Attention, do the exercises in class
2. Go to the Writing Center
3. Revise, multiple times, 3 or more drafts before the final paper
4. Proper Antecedent's
5. Make sure everything flows well

Those are the pieces of advice I would give to new students

Real frustrating

When you are on D2l taking a quiz, and for some reason or another you stop and close the D2l window and do something else. Maybe I went to get some food or to class or something, I dont remember. D2l normally saves your quiz answers for the longest time, so you never even have to worry about stopping and then coming back and finishing up the quiz later. I was doing my business math homework, homework number 11. I got all the way to question 9, hit the save all responses button, and then closed the window to go do something. When it came back to it last night all my answers had dissapeared and it took me like an hour and a half just to get that far. I was too sick of math 115a to possible do anymore, so i just bailed on the quiz and got a 20%. Its kind of frustrating when things like that happen.

Journal 6

When it comes to the topic of voice and tone, I personally believe that it is not all that difficult to set the proper voice and tone of a paper. While it is a much more difficult feat to fully convince your audience of what you're trying to get across, your tone and voice can be portrayed jsut how you want them to as long as you follow one simple rule. The most important rule here is to write in the same style that you would use if you were speaking.

This doesn't mean to write a paper as if it were an audible speech, but rather it is easy to speak in the proper tone and voice if you are to speak, but sometimes putting it down on paper the tone gets lost in translation. The easiest way to avoid this is to speak in the same style, only substituting words so that it makes sense in the written form.

I believe many writers think thoughts out in their head, and then transfer it to paper. One beneficial exercise I have done is to say each sentence out loud as I am brainstorming on how to craft the idea in my head into a well structured sentence i can put down on paper. So far, this exercise has proven to be the most beneficial to my writing when it comes to tone and voice.

Overall, it is a difficult topic to fully master, and Im sure I haven't even come close to learning a mastery of it. The best thing you can do is to utilize all of the exercises possible and then to try and try again. These are my thoughts on tone and voice.

End of the semester cramming

With the end of the semester coming up real soon, It seems like all of my teachers pack the vast majority of the point in the class into the last 3 weeks. In all of my classes this week I have the 3rd exam, and then in 2 weeks I have the final exam. That means in nearly all of my classes theres still like 40% of the total points of the course yet to be given out.

This is both a good and a bad thing. It means that while I've been hard at work all semester, Im still really only half way to my final grades. It just means that the next 2 weeks i gotta do work on my grades because I could potentially raise all of my grades by a full letter if I put in enough effort the rest of the year.

Its lame that it all has to come at the end of the semester when Im sick of doing work and I just want to kick back and relax and do nothing. Oh well, I guess thats just life. I just gotta suck it up and get good enough grades in order to come back to zona next year. Good luck with your final exams everyone

Math 115a

This class is easily the hardest class I've ever taken in my life. It sucks because Math 115B is gonna be even harder than 115A. It doesn't help that its a math class and theyre trying to teach 300 students at the same time in a lecture class. On top of that, the homeworks dont prepare you for the quizzes and tests, and the instructors never cover the things that will be on the quizzes and tests. the instructors prepare you for the homework that night, but the tests are completely conceptual with a little bit of calculation, while the homeworks are all calculations and never even touch on the concepts. I got a tutor, that helps a lot but half of the time my tutor cant figure out what the teachers are even asking for. She knows how to do all of the work and calculation etc. but half of the time the teacher ask completely conceptual questions with terrible word choice and they make it overly complicated just to figure out what the question is asking. Please U of A, turn 115A and B back into 30 person classes so we can ask questions and talk to the teacher instead of relying on tutors and peers to figure it out. Thanks.

Journal 5

When I look at the statute outside the Harvill building, the most predominant theme I see is the battle between opposing forces. I see two sides in an eternal struggle and neither side is making any progress. On each side you have two figures, representing the different groups of people who believe in one idea but believe in different ways to achieve their goal. You have one statue in one stance and the other in another stance. This represents the way they choose different means to achieve their goal.

Then, both sides are locked in an eternal struggle of trying to push this wall, but no matter how long they stand there trying to push they wont make any progress. I believe this represents how in all of life's challenges there are opposing forces and neither side would make nearly as much progress as they would if they were to stop fighting each other and work together.

The statues overall are an analogy of how teamwork can accomplish much, while each individual working toward their own personal gain will only achieve a fraction of what good teamwork could achieve.

End of the year

Its pretty sick the end of the year is coming up, Im so ready to go home and have fun all summer. Granted, Arizona is fun too. But its a different kind of fun. Its like the only fun thing to do in Tucson is to party. Whereas theres always fun things to do in San Diego.

Although, it kind of sucks that with the end of the year we gotta take more finals, and then i gotta tell my parents my grades, which will probably disappoint. Then I gotta convince them I don't need to work this summer, even though they'll try to make me work because of my grades.

Pretty lame, and that I dont get to see any of the UA homies anymore. I'll get to see all the old homies and girls from San Diego. I guess it'll be pretty chill, get to chill with a different big group of people.

Easter

Easter's a fun holiday. You get to see all your family again, have a barbecue, drink with your parents...

I went home back to San Diego for easter, flew out thursday night and came back sunday night. Going home is always fun, but you add into that easter and it only gets better.

You get a full weekend to fill up on good food before your forced back to the catcard food. You get to hang out with your family which you never get to do during the year. Normally its not that fun, but only being able tos ee your family a couple times during the year makes it really fun to go back and see them. It also helps if you like your family.

I went up to my sisters house with the whole family and had a barbecue in their new house that they just finished putting in a pool and landscaping the whole backyard. It was sunny and 72 degrees, just a perfect day for a barbecue. Then you get mass candy all weekend.

Easters fun

Journal 4

I read through the descriptions of each of the twelve common errors in writing. Many of them are things I've overcome through the use of re-writing multiple times. Howeber, the one that most applied to me is pronouns. On my paper's I often get UA or unclear antecedent quite a few times. This is one thing I struggle with because I try to make the paper sound and flow well and sometimes using the full name or title of whatever your describing really gets in the way of that. Instead I prefer to use pronouns as often as possible if I have clearly stated who I am referring to a couple sentances prior.

The other thing is comma splices. For as long as I can remember I have had issue with proper grammer when it comes to using commas, colons, and semicolons. I dont think I ever really learned what the rules were and just kind of picked them up. I think thats why I most commonly make mistakes regarding the use of colons, semi colons, and commas.

Journal 3

So I had an argument with my dad about my classes. I took a class online over winter break so I had a total of 18 units. Then I missed my priority registration so I ended up getting 12 units instead of 15. When he found out (recently) he got all pissed saying he pays the same price whether I take 12 or 15 units so while hes paying I have to take 15 units or more.

I countered with that's why I took a winter session class. Now Im still on track even though I missed registration.

Then he countered and said I shouldn't have missed registration, and I should have 15 units minimum. He said That 4 yrs was the max and i should finish sooner by taking more credits.

I just said Ok my bad and moved on.

If I wanted to I could have sat there and drawn out the debate forever until we reached the same exact conclusion that we just reached. Only I didn't want to argue with him because its impossible to win.

My biases played into it by knowing him and just deciding to cut my losses rather than argue.

In this way I analyzed the situation and decided the best plan of action would be to end it and move on. I lost, yes. But if I had kept arguing I'd be in the same position as before except that the person who pays my bills and feeds me would be pissed off.

So really....I won. Thats how i won the argument

PSA: sunscreen

I grew up in San Diego, and living there your pretty much accustomed to whatever the sun can manage to throw at you. I've surfed for four or five hours in a single day and only put on sunscreen once. Didn't burn. I've gone an entire summer only wearing a shirt on select occasions. Rarely burned. But if there's one thing I've learned over this spring break its that no matter what, spending literally all day every day for a week with little sunscreen is guaranteed to make you burn.

Too all you who dont know: if your snowboarding and its 50 degrees out and the sun is shining, you might want to put on some sunscreen. Anything. Just dont go with nothing.

I had forgotten how harsh the suns ray's can be when they reflect off of the snow. I went boarding at christmas and didnt put sunscreen on and didnt burn. Then again, it was pretty cloudy and snowing most of the time.

I spent 3 days boarding in the perfect conditions to get burned and did I ever. Its not fun. Use some sunscreen

Snow

I love snowboarding. I mean.....I love Surfing, but I really really love snowboarding. My first true action sport. My dad got me on a snowboard at age 5. I was miniature. Its like when you see those little kids on skis learning how to ski and your like....can that kid even walk ?!?

I generally go to mammoth for a week right after Christmas, and another week during spring break.

I went to mammoth over break, it was amazing. On Saturday they got 11" of snow, on Sunday they got 8" of snow. I got there on Monday.

Monday was 50 degrees and sunny all over the mountain with barely even noticeable winds. I wore a Tshirt and a thin jacket expecting to be perfect and I was burning up by the time I was done with like 2 runs through the park.

My favorite part about snowboarding is you can observe other rider's techniques in the park, and apply them to yourself fairly easily. I've mastered the doubles and some basic tricks but I'd been struggling with the triples in the south park at mammoth for like a year now. I'd landed a few clean but alot of the time the gap on the jump was just so big that it was hard for me to keep my balance in proper alignment.

I spent like 25 minutes in the lineup watching the speed and technique other riders used to hit the triples. Eventually I went for a section of three and I came up a little short on the first, skipped the second to build speed for the third, and then I hit the third going what I thought was waaaay to fast but I ended up landing just a bit far but still on the perfect downslope. I was amped to land a clean triple. After that There was a 20 ft snow tabletop. I had way too much speed because this jump launched you alot vertical instead of horizontal and long story short I was nearly able to lean my body back into position before the jump but the back end of my board was too far forward and I ended up taking a fat chunk out of the snow in the ground with my face. Got a nice swollen black and blue eye and a scab under my eyebrow and my nose started bleeding. At least I didnt break it...

This is why snowboarding is the best and worst sport. I nail a clean triple and get on of the best feelings in the world, 5 seconds later my eye is nearly swollen shut and already getting black.

Mans best Friend

They say that Dogs are a mans best friend.

Why do they say that?

I dunno. But I'd have to agree. When Im in Tucson, I miss my dog. My sidekick that just follows me wherever. I go outside to grab something from my car and my dog follows right behind me to see what Im doing. I post up on the couch and turn on the TV, he lays down right at my feet.

When I get to see my dog, hes so excited and he wags his tail so hard that he puts marks in the walls and could probably kill a small child with one swing of the tail.

Theres something awesome about an animal that just wants to kick it with you all day and is down to ride no matter where your going. I might need to run to seven eleven for a minute to grab some wraps or go shopping for 2 hours and hes always down to sit in the back of my truck and hold down the fort for me.

Vice Versa, I could just kick it with my dog all day and be content.

They say dogs take on the personality of their owners.

I probably spent 80% or more of the total time hes been alive with him. All the time Ive had him since I was 11 if I wasnt at school or at football, he was by my side. Once I could drive he was always with me.

Maybe thats why we mesh so well and Im happy to hang out with my dog all day.

RVCA Sale on the Mall

Lemme start this off by saying RVCA has been my favorite clothing company for a couple years now. Having lived in San Diego my entire life, thats not really saying much. RVCA is everywhere in San Diego and if you know the right places you can get a grip of tees for like $10 a piece.

There are a couple reasons that RVCA is really sick though. The first one being that they're shirts are ridiculously comfortable, lightweight, and durable. The only shirt's I've ever felt that have been nearly as comfortable as RVCA are affliction shirts and those are pretty expensive. Theyre also extremely durable for some reason, I would have thought that they would shrink easy and fall apart easier considering how lightweight they are, but they are my shirts that never shrink and never stretch out or fade, even when I throw one on fresh out of a surf session and my skin is all wet and salty still.

The other sick thing about RVCA is that they design their clothing for thin and tall people. A lot of clothing companies their shirts are a certain length in size Large, and then going up in sizes doesnt make them longer it just makes them wider. Other companies design their shirts for fat people, but RVCA tries to cater to the surfer/skater crowd and they know none of us are fat. Being 6'4" after most shirts shrink they look dumb because of how short they are. With RVCA I can pickup a XL or 2XL and they only get longer, not wider. That way when they shrink a little in the wash they still fit perfect instead of just barely reaching my belt.

These are the reasons RVCA is the best company to buy tees from. Period.

Campus Health

It takes forever to get through campus health. I got up at 8:30 am and went into campus health to get my throat checked out because its been killing me lately. First you have to wait to see a nurse to see if your sick enough to see a doctor, then you gotta see another nurse to ask you all sorts of questions to really make sure if you can see a doctor. Then finally you get to see a doctor. Inbetween all of these stages are waiting periods of like 45 minutes. This was early in the morning on a rainy day when Campus Health looked nearly dead. I cant imagine trying to go to Campus Health on any regular day or around noon. When all was said and done I got my perscriptions and am on my way to healing my sinus infection but it took 3 and a half hours just to get out of there. I ended up signing the papers for my perscriptions and walking out at 11:55 when I had arrived at 8:30. I feel like it would be cool if they put a little money into improving campus health.

Time managmenet

Whenever I have an assigned paper or project that I know I should be doing everyday and getting little parts done I just dont do it. Not because Im busy or any other reason, but just because I'd rather go do something more fun.

And then I say to myself like "Im gonna wake up early tomorrow morning and do my homework." But then all of a sudden its 4am and I get home and crash. Then its 2pm by the time I get up eat its time for class. Class goes by and all of a sudden its 6pm and once Im done there I'd rather go do something fun than go home and do homework.

Its a repeating cycle and I need to figure out a way to beat the cycle and just get things done anyways.

Iphones are a love hate relationship

When I first got my Iphone, I thought it was the sickest thing ever. The pure amount of things you can do with apps is priceless. I can do literally everything I can do on my computer right from my Iphone. Its a little inconvenient to do some things, but I can surf the internet whenever I have a couple minutes to kill. The best part is the entertainment value. If I have 5 minutes to kill or 50 minutes, I can always count on my Iphone to make it go by quick.

All of this being said, Theres one huge drawback.

You cant get insurance on an Iphone. This sucks, because while I may not be particularly prone to breaking phones, every once in a while I have one of those "Dude, Wheres my Car?" nights....

You know, one of those nights where for some reason you lose all the things in your pockets you normally hold onto no matter what and wake up in a strange place.

1. Dropped it and shattered the whole screen. Got a new one for $299
2. Got pushed into a pool with the Iphone. Bought a new one for $200
3. Dropped it again, cracked the screen, got the screen replaced for $80
4. Got some 'water' on it playing 'water' pong. Now it wont charge.

All in all I've gone through four Iphones since they first came out. I hate them for making me buy so many but I love the Iphone

Why does Tucson always smell so bad?

I'll just be walking along enjoying my day when all of a sudden a disgusting smell invades my airspace. I've come to know this terrifying smell as the smell of Tucson. I've been trying to locate the exact source of the smell for the longest time, but so far I only have a few possible reasons. They are that Tucson is so dirty the smell comes off the streets, or maybe its the pollution. I dunno. It could be a sewage smell, or maybe just dirty people.

Either way, Im sick of walking outside only to be punched in the face by the odor of Tucson. It doesn't seem to be such a problem on Campus as it does pretty much everywhere else in the city. This might be because campus is fairly clean while the rest of the city probably never has anyone to maintain it.

I guess I gotta take the good with the bad, to go to U of A you gotta put up with the smell of Tucson

Journal #2 - Analysis

The piece i chose to analyze is a movie called Friday starring Ice Cube and Christ Tucker. I was bored and hungover on Sunday trying to do some homework so I popped in Friday and laid in bed so I could come up with a proper analysis of the movie.

First of all, the entire cast of the movie Friday is black. This was a popular trend among black directors in the 90's and a few directors continue to produce shows this way. Its safe to say that the intended audience would be primarily black people considering the type of movie it is. However, the intended audience is not the actual audience. The actual audience is very diverse with people of all races loving this movie.

In the movie, Craig and Smoky are two homies that get laid off from their jobs on Thursday night. Smokey owes a drug dealer $200 and the movie focuses on their antics in trying to come up with the money. They get jacked, run from a drive by, get in a fight, and continually mess up every opportunity to get the money.

Their antics can be related to something three stooge like, only in a poor black neighborhood in '95 instead of white people in the 20's and 30's. Every time they have an opportunity to get the money one of them manages to do something unbelievably dumb to lose it. The relationships among character can also be related to the three stooges in that you have a fairly responsible character who comes up with plans and sticks to them, and a sidekick who ruins every plan. They stick together anyways because they're homies, much like the three stooges stuck together despite their mess ups. This movie is a perfect example of the way the art of comedy relates to even the most diverse populations over the span of 60 years in much the same way. This movie will continue to be a classic forever.

Intro

My name is Jake Kelly and I come from San Diego, California. My major is pre-business and I hope I can get into Eller. I'm 19 and my favorite thing in the world is the surf. Ever since I was a kid I always loved being in the Ocean and so living in California provided me with endless coastline and prime surf spots whenever I felt like surfing. There something about the feeling of the saltwater on your back and being able to use the power of the ocean to have fun. I get attacked by sea animals alot including being bitten by small shark, been stung by two stingrays, and nearly getting eaten by a sea lion. Theres not really any worry about sharks or stingrays, those are generally pretty minor. The sea lions are crazy though, they'll hang out in the breaks underwater and then pop out to get some air at the top while your just kickin it waiting for a wave. If you get within a foot or two or touch one your pretty much eaten no matter what.

My second favorite thing is my Dog, I could kick it with my Dog all day. He's a yellow lab named Bear and weighs 100 pounds. I got him as a pup at 8 weeks and hes been following me around ever since. No matter where I go he's always down to come and I don't even need a leash. No matter what he just posts up on my right side and goes to sleep. He rolls to the beach with me and If I don't tie him up in my truck bed he'll wait until I get into the break and start paddling then come follow me out into the water.

Third favorite thing is snowboarding. I've only been surfing for 5 years but I've been snowboarding for 13 years so I'm better at snowboarding. Partly because its an easier sport and partly because I've spent so much time on the mountains. I spend at least 4 weeks boarding every year. The reason i like surfing more than snowboarding is no matter how big you go surfing your only risk is animals and getting pounded by waves. Snowboarding when you go big you risk nearly every bone in your body. I've broken 3 bones and had too many other smaller injuries to count. Still, snowboarding is #3 and thats high on the list.

The End.