Wolverine

I watched the Wolverine movie this weekend. I liked it, it was fast paced and exciting, but I just don't get the big deal about it. I understand that some people are very interested in comic books, but that gene passed me by. However, I do appreciate the cinematic spectacular that this movie was. Watching this movie, I did not know much of Wolverines history. All I really knew was that he was a cranky X-Man that rescued that young girl that couldn't touch people. And honestly, I think the movie was a bit generic. I think this movie was supposed to give insight into his origin and why he got so cranky. He had family problems, love lost, and was just angry to begin with. 

I tried, I really did to get as excited about this movie as other people are, but it just wasn't there for me. I have family issues, I have loved and lost, and I get in a bad mood, and yes, I will admit that it would be nice to grow out knives from my hands and go to town on the people who pissed me off, but I don't get to do that. How do people relate to this guy? He is hailed as a hero, but is he? He doesn't solve anything by killing or maiming people, that's an easy way out. In reality a hero would solve his inner demons instead of acting out violently to people who are unlucky enough to cross paths with him on the wrong day. 

I can appreciate that he has the desire to be a good guy, but just because you kill bad guys doesn't make you good. I just don't think that the Wolverine is all that interesting. He struggles with the classic man vs. self internally and man vs. foe externally. With all the possibilities that a comic book character has, could he not become something a little bit more exciting than that?

I will admit that Wolverine the character is pretty awesome. he has ripped abs, mutton chops and the ability to make everything behind him explode. Since this assignment is to respond to the movie in some way, my response is boooo. His story is diluted and he is cranky without a cause. A friend who went with me to the movie was a very dedicated X-Man fan, and he said that he was disappointed with Wolverine and the movie as well. I do relate to the part where Wolverine is in Canada and his former war buddy comes and takes his brother. One time my sister went out with a guy that I broke up with the previous week. If I had knife fingers, I would have used them. 

I think was a total guy movie, and I just couldn't pull a piece of the movie to really relate too. 

Although- my favorite part of the movie is the naked scene. Hugh Jackman nude with mutton chops was worth the 10 bucks.

Revised Diagnostic essay

In April of 2002 I went on a trip from Orange County, Ca to New Orleans with my college roommate. I had to go to a funeral and she was nice enough to accompany me on the drive. We packed up my dodge neon and left town early in the morning. In order to fully appreciate this trip, you have to understand the two personalities in the car. I was 20 years old at the time, and anxiously awaiting my 21st birthday the following week. I was a budding competitive surfer, a fitness model, a Top 40 music addict, and all around party girl from South Florida. My roommate, Jen, was 22 and from a small town called Walla Walla, Wa. She grew up riding horses, listening to country music, fixing trucks (cars were not able to handle the roads in Walla Walla), and chewing tobacco. I had never met a girl who constantly had a dip in her mouth, so I was slightly intrigued by Jen, as I think she was by me. We were total opposites but some how became very good friends. I think it was our shared love of Perfect Strangers reruns to brought us together.

It was somewhere around the Arizona border that the air conditioning gave out. The temperature was 98 degrees by noon, which also happens to be the name of my favorite boy band at the time. Jen was nice enough to let me have control of the CD player most of the time, and now that we had to drive with all the windows rolled down (and I mean literally rolled down, no power locks, windows, or steering in this car), I got to blast all my favorite mixed CD's I had. I knew Jen wasn't thrilled when my Destiny's Child / En Vogue mix came out of the CD case, but she was a good sport. 

We stayed over night at a motel called The Daniel Boone Inn somewhere in Arizona and had a dinner at a nearby diner. At dinner, we met some local Mexican Indians who taught us about there culture and some of the beliefs that involve the powers that the earth has over our situations. For example, they believe that trees hold the secrets of the past and people with a special gift are able to listen to what the trees are trying to say. Also, they believed that the lavender plant brings good luck to people who carry it with them. It all sounded good to us, and it was very interesting to learn how their culture lived. They also prayed a special prayer for the funeral we were going to that would help my deceased grandfather find his way to Heaven. I appreciated their generosity. 

We left Arizona and were driving through New Mexico when Jen screamed at me to stop the car. I was very startled by her outburst and slammed the brakes and puled off to the side of the highway. I have never seen Jen run as fast as she did into a field. I yelled at her and tried to find out what she was doing but she didn't reply, she just kept running. Soon, I saw her grabbing at some leaves and trying to pull them out of the ground, but she kept falling on her ass in the process. The loss of balance was most likely due to the deal we made that 1 person would drive for 8 hours a day, and the other person would drink for 8 hours a day. But eventually she regained her balance, pulled the plant up and came back to the car with a large stalk of fresh lavender. I still have a piece of that plant in a frame, just as a reminder of what a great friend she still is. The picture above is one of me and Jen, the blonde girl, and our other roommate Sandra. 

Eclectic Community College Classes

English 111 was very interesting. It's very heavy handed on papers, and since I took an 8 week course, the papers overlapped and can become overwhelming if your class load is to heavy. When I enrolled, I assumed the class would be diagramming sentences and maybe writing a book report. We didn't do any of those things. We wrote restuarant reviews, personal reflections, and movie reviews, among other things. I appreciated the freedom to write in any tone that we chose, and the ability to choose topics and subjects that interested us. We also reviewed class mates papers before they were due, which helped us fine tune papers that were due. The class meetings are relaxed and there is a lot of open discussion. 

For me, the down side was that the class was so heavy handed on computer skills, which I lack. Paul was helpful and understood my school and work schedule that would inhibit my availibility to the computer lab. There is also a lot of print outs you have to read and bring to class, which means you need to be very organized and prepared in order to discuss the readings.  You also have to spend a lot of time in the library printing out the course work. For papers due, the instructions are online which needs to be printed out and brought to class as well. 

What I liked most was the class mates I had. I am technically a UVA student, but am catching up on some courses that didn't transfer from my previous University. I love Community College. It is so eclectic and a wide range of life styles were represented. Since I took this as a night course, we had a few students who were recent high school graduates, but mostly working adults with jobs, families, and working on furthering their careers. It was inspiring to see so many determined people making the most of the 24 hours they have in a day in order to better their lives. 

There is a lot of creative freedom in the class, and we were able to choose a topic and write a paper and do a class presentation explaining our ideas and opinions on the chosen topics. However, there are some topics that are off limits. There are a few guidelines, but mostly the student has total freedom to display their topics in a way that interest them. This was also a way to show your personality and learn more about your classmates. 

Another down side is the word requirements for all the assignments. I have taken courses with this type of guidelines, but I prefer when professors give the students directions that explain the writing can be any length, as long as the information is complete, meaning that there is a beginning, middle, end, and the research is thorough.  I think this allows the student to do research and write a paper without pressure of adding fillers. 

I think that some of these papers or projects could be assigned as group assignments in order to lighten to course load in  this 8 week courses. This also would give students the chance to interact more with each other and I think the presentation would be more lively and interesting if there were more than one person working on it. Also, I think the teacher should be responsible for providing snacks, since the class is 3 hours long. Another suggestion would be that there is a little less comic book talk. I just don't get it, I appreciate it, but don't get it. 

And if you get bored, here are some cool websites and up top thats a picture I took this weekend. (it's required)

 Facts

Bored

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TV

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People are Bastard Covered Bastards with Bastard Fillings

I’ve had a bad day. I woke up to my cell phone ringing. Since it was 5 am, I ignored it. But it kept ringing and ringing, and then I saw the alarm clock on the night stand. It wasn’t 5 am, it was 9 am and I was 2 hours late for my shift at the hospital. I answer the phone and was screamed at by my supervisor for a good 10 minutes. Luckily, I live 3 miles away from the hospital I was assigned to that day, unluckily, I wasn’t at home. So I scooped up my things, found a semi- clean but very wrinkled pair of scrubs in my car, and with no cup of coffee and no shower, I headed into work. I was doing pretty well at selling a lame excuse about car trouble until my attending doctor pointed out that I was wearing two different shoes. So now it was pretty obvious that I was going to be on a 15 hour walk of shame. Awesome.

Throughout the shift, I was puked on, spit on, bled on, kicked, and cussed out. But that’s a pretty normal day for a med student. Around midnight I start driving home absolutely exhausted. That yellow light turned red way faster than normal, and I knew that jeep the moment it hit me. Out stepped my ex boyfriend and his new girlfriend. I don’t mind that he found someone new at all. In fact, I’m happy for him. She seems like a nice person, however, she has cankles. I guess that’s something he can overlook, but I just don’t get it. This isn’t the first time we have all run into each other though. Why can’t you run into an ex when you’re looking good, and not covered in bodily fluids? It never fails, the last time I ran into this ex it was 3 am at a Rite Aid. I was buying a jumbo box of tampons and a gallon of ice cream. He was buying condoms. Awesome.

After sorting out the incident, I finally get home. I love living at the ocean front, but I hate that I can’t afford to buy my own place yet. I rent a duplex, and my neighbors decided this would be the perfect night to have a “Boot Scootin’ Boogie”. I’m not sure what that is exactly, but it seems to require loud country music, a dozen ‘good ol’ boys’, 3 Confederate flags, and a case of Miller High Life, the champagne of beers. I saw the beer pong table, the tubs of tobacco, and at least 5 dogs in the front lawn. Awesome.

It was pretty obvious that I wouldn’t get any sleep, so I headed over to the 7/11, grabbed a brown bag special and headed to the beach. It was beautiful night, I took the picture above to try and catch the lights reflecting off the water. I’ve always found the beach relaxing and soothing. I grew up in Florida, I’ve always lived by the water and there is some cheesy analogy I should insert here about the changing tides and the changes happening in my life, but I will refrain. There is an upside tot his douche of a day. I discovered something about myself that I’m sure will be with me for the rest of my life. It’s one of those discoveries that transcend the entire BS and bring you back down to earth, and I never in a million years would have found this out if it weren’t for the events of today. I had no idea how good a $4.25 bottle strawberry – banana

Mad Dog is. Awesome.