My synapses burn like stars.

I hope by now I've made it abundantly clear how much fun I'm having with this blog. I take any creative leeway I'm given on writing assignments and run with it, wildly, while giggling. I think about writing in the same manner as music, and consider any chance to write a chance at self expression, self exploration, and self amusement. If you don't like your own writing, your own thoughts, how can you go on?

Words, like notes, can be strung together in all sorts of interesting ways, ways not strictly 'proper' under the metric of the language, or on the other hand,  perfectly proper, but with no grounds in reality. When Nick replied "We were eaten by bears." as an example of the correct usage of were, I had to bite down on my hand to keep myself from laughing. That sentence, while grammatically correct, will never be spoken out loud in a serious way, except by a calm, well spoken, camper's ghost.

Oh, but I digress. About me! Aside from my potential grounds for committal wonderful, creative cognition, what else is there to say? I like the bass guitar, reading, video games, and if I don't land a tech job after Year Up, I could always try my hand at being a poor person  writer or musician.

Hopefully, it won't come to that.

An Open Letter to LCO, Section B.

Today was the first day of week 3! So a big yay to all us for getting this far.

Now that I got the patting on the back out of the way, there is something I feel needs addressing:

I have never heard a room filled with full grown adults be so loud and continually disrespectful.

This isn't high school, every one of us is here because we were chosen, it's a privilege and a rare opportunity, one that isn't going to present itself again. I'll tell you right now, I'm not going to let someone distract me and ruin this chance. I'm not going back to Safeway because someone can't keep quiet.

Maybe it's because no one has recorded an infraction for it yet, but by this point in the program we should have gotten quieter, not louder and louder and LOUDER.

I know we can pull it together without someone having to be made an example of.

Seriously now,

Miguel L.

"World shocked by U.S. execution of Troy Davis"

http://www.cnn.com/2011/09/22/world/davis-world-reaction/index.html

My reaction? Good. I'm glad so many people still have a conscience. Shock is the appropriate reaction to an event like this.

Yesterday, Georgia executed Troy Davis, a man convicted of killing a police officer. Seven out of nine witnesses later recanted their testimony, casting a large shadow of possibility that this man was innocent of this crime.

In the days leading to the execution, the case received attention from news networks worldwide. There were protests in France, pleas of clemency from the Pope and former U.S. president Jimmy Carter, but at 11:08 pm EDT, Troy Davis was declared dead. He maintained his innocence during his final words.

This series of events has put a fire under the debate of the death penalty. In the end Troy Davis may be a figurehead, a martyr, leading to the abolishing of this practice I'm ashamed to say is still an American institution. I can only hope this the catalyst that starts a serious restructuring of our entire prison system.

I feel that America is above the death penalty. It's a brutal solution to the complex problem of what to do with our most serious offenders, but we should not settle for the easiest answer, especially when a life is on the line. The sooner the death penalty is relegated to the history books, the better off we will be. It's an important milestone in social justice, many other countries have abolished the death penalty, and I'm not satisfied with the excuse of 'this is just how America does it'.

We can do better.

Small Town New School Blues

Or How I Learned To Stop Worrying Grades and Love Girls and Music

After middle school, my family moved to Vallejo, California. You'd think a move into a more affluent and better funded academic environment would do wonders for someone who was thriving scholastically in the barren wasteland of the OUSD. Guess again. Vallejo was absolute culture shock. I don't exaggerate when I say I had no real friends until high school. High school was the first time I enjoyed the company of people my age, and suddenly I was playing catch up to my social maturation.

Grades took a backseat to girls, friends, and rock and roll. Teachers took less notice of a student performing well. District money was spent on lighting for sports fields, and renovating auditoriums. Our campus was originally a medium sized middle school, turned into a high school crowded with portable classrooms, and a lot of shifty kids. The student body at large was apathetic. All around me, students squandered opportunity, totally ignorant of how good they had it. Coming from Oakland I found this particularly offensive. Someone was beaten so badly they had to be airlifted. Arrests weren't uncommon. All while all this was happening all I wanted was to talk to girls, listen to music, pass with a C, and leave this backwater town.

And when I do I'll never come back.

The time is 10:40 PM.

And the only other people who I've seen post comments on the blogs of our colleagues  are Mike and Elvis.

Come on Section B, this is our only BC homework, it only takes five minutes, and it's actually pretty fun.

My Revolving Vocabulary Door

Our writing prompt states that psychologists believe our peers, rather than our parents, have a larger influence on our language. It presents this information as if we should be surprised.

When we're very young, our parents certainly have almost total influence on how we learn to speak. These are the people who gave us our first words. It becomes very clear, however, that the influence they exert can be eroded. The first time a child walks into a classroom, an entire new influence dominates the way they communicate, and it isn't the person in front of the chalkboard.

If you read a transcript of a conversation between my friends and I, in between the minutia of daily conversation and casual swearing, you're likely to find several phrases completely devoid of context to an outsider. If I read a transcript of a conversation between my friends and I from a few years ago, I'd be just as stumped as you. The language between friends is so fluid it becomes hard to keep track of. Phrases turn into memes, memes morph into something unrecognizable, and are promptly disposed of the next time we experience something new as a group, and find the humor in it.

It's said that when Batman puts on the mask, what he's actually doing is taking off the Bruce Wayne costume. When I walk into Year Up I have to take off the cape and ears from my language. If you catch me outside the building after school and hear me using the words 'banana sandwich' in a way not intended by Nature, just move on, safe in the knowledge that we can talk clearly tomorrow morning.