Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Understanding Comics

The first four chapters were repetitive, long and boring read. I had to force myself to finish the reading. Some parts intrigued me. I liked on page 26 how he showed how what you would normally call somthing, really isnt true. For example he said "this is not a car" next to a picture of a car. For me at first this was hard to grasp in the previous pages, therefore this example of his repetition actually helped me understand this concept. His ideas made me think outside of my normal everyday way of thinking wich i liked. In a way it reminded me of my philosofy class. However at some points in the book it was overdone and annoyed me. I liked chapter three the best because I actually had similar thoughts when I was a kid. At the beggingin of the chapter, he says " When i was very young i had a recurrent daydream that the whole world was just a show put on for my benefit, that unless i was present to see things they just ...ceased to exist." He goes onto explain we as humans rely on trust. He says I have never been to tyland but i TRUST that it is there, I have never been in outter space but I trust that the world is flat. I thought this idea was interesting.

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Richards

So far this is my favorite essay we have read for this class. I could relate to the relationship between the granddaughter and the grandmother. I was very close to my grandmother as well and we shared a similar relationship. One thing i noticed while reading this was the how Richards showed over time how their relationship changed. At the beginning the grandmother was portrayed as strong and self sufficient, however over the course of the essay this changed. Richards started taking care of her grandmother almost comparing the relationship to a mother with her baby. By using the baby moniter and the cracking and humming, Richards shows how dependent the grandmother is to her. One question i had was how the Father died? I read this over twice and still couldn't find a definite answer. It mention the grandmother in a dream looking for his mangled body in the grass and this led me to believe he died in a violent way. The actual fishing story was touching. I loved the way it was described. It showed the love between the grandmother and the grandfather which explained how deeply she must of missed him. Because they didnt say more than 10 words to each other during the trip and It is her favorite memory of her late husband shows true love.

Monday, September 15, 2008

sister/The american man at age ten/ravioli

gopnic wrote a confusing but insightfull essay where he discusses how materialistic and busy people in new york city are. I liked how he used a little girl to express his views. Without telling the reader directly he uses the character Mr. RAvioli to show how a typical New yorker acts. The daughter was lacking attention from Ravioli and would not complain about it but just casually say how busy he always was, wich showd that she was used to everyone in the city being way to busy. I like how the author used his sister to show how other parts of the country differed from NYC. CAlifornia in comparison seemed alot more  layed back. The essay was confusing but i think i got jist of it. At the same time Sister confused me.  I understand that the little sister looked up to the big sister but the ending kind of confused me. It wasnt really a story and had no plot but it just explained her relationship with her sister. She explains how different they are. She gave no examples she just told. Although at the end she lied to the boy and said she wanted to be nothing like her sister. The older sister actually was the honest one according to the younger one, so it showed instead of telling how they were different. The younger one actually portrays the sister as being cold when she explains how she hit the deer and aimed for the seagull. I dont understand why besides looks why the younger sister looks up to the older sister.  

Ashes

I enjoyed this essay. I liked the sarcasm the mother had. It wasnt the usual sob story like the other essay about the mother dieing. Sadaris really differed from the author from the love of my life because he portrayed his mother as sarcastic and cold at times. The other author portrayed her mother as almost to perfect to the point where it  was unbelievable.  The essays were similar in the sence of the authors brutal honesty, like how the author tells the reader in the love of my life how she reached such a low because of her mother. And in Ashes sadaris is so honest about his mothers personality.

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

the love of my life

I just got done reading the love of my life and I am disappointed. I almost wish she did kill herself just so the reader had some form of closure at the end. Or at least recognize some glimps of hope for her getting better. In a way her organizing her whole trip showed that she may have been getting slightly better, but the end proved nothing had changed. The poor husband mark was actually in love with her and was a great husband to her. Why did she turn to sex to get over her grief? Why did the first guy bite her lip to the point where it bled? Did that violence actually lead her to her pattern of sleeping with more and more different guys? what happened to the herion addict rocker. This story really did not impress me or hold my attention. It was annoying to read. People Die. she was way to overdramatic and way to obsessed with her mother.

Monday, September 8, 2008

101 ways to cook a hamburger

I liked this piece of writing. I liked how the two stories were so different and this one took place over years and the other one was over a period of a day or so. This showed the confusion gay people have starting way earlier in life than most people know. The parents of the boy seem very old fashion. I think the story actually takes required place a while ago. The boy ends up falling in love with his friend that he wanted to be like. I liked how at the end of the book the guy ended up being happy and bringing it back to the girl who had previously called him a "fag". It gave the kind of depressing story a nice happy twist at the end.   

the fourth state of matter

I really liked this piece of writing. It was unpredictable and caught me off guard. The story is realistic and gripping. at the beginning of the story it seemed straight fore ward and about a dog and the dogs master. From the beginning of the story know one would know where the story was going and where the plot was going. Where the story caught my interest was when the suicide note came into play. The reader didn't know that the man was not only going to kill himself but also many others. How the writer switched back and forth from the story of the dog and the suicide story was interesting. I was thinking it was comparing the two scenes and contrasting innocence in the dog and innocence and confusion in the murderer. I liked how the story ends.   

introduction

My name is Kelsey Walsh, Im from Falmouth Mass, which is on Cape Cod. Im on the golf team at Hartford. So far I like playing golf and all the girls on the team. I also am enjoying living at University of Hartford. Golf is alot of work and a little overwhelming, but Im thinking it will pay off. Ive never done a blog before. I miss the beaches from where I live and miss the sight of the ocean. But i keep in touch with my friends and family so it is okay. I have one brother who graduated from college this year. He went to PC and graduated with a degree in business. He moved to New Jersey to get a job in the city. So now my parents live alone together. Besides golf i like to ski and snowboard. I usually go a bunch of times over the winter usually at killington MT. or attitash or cannon or loon. I started skiing when i was in fourth grade and then started snowboarding in 8th. Golf I started when i was in 8th grade.