The Color Purple: 1st Ten Pages

So I read this book as a freshman. And I probably wasn't old enough and mature enough to read it then. I remember liking it, I remember being horrified at the graphic descriptions and beauty. Now reading the first ten pages is a bit different. It is graphic, violent and actually awful. But I think I can appreciate it better now. My mind is better able to process what's happening instead of just being horrified at the violence going on. I think I'd really enjoy this book now because I'm older

Factoid Friday #4

When John Steinbeck wrote "Of Mice and Men" he intended it to be both a novella and a play. The story has been adapted for film and theatre nine times since then.

Of Mice and Men. (2014, February 20). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 16:35,   March 7, 2014.

Vocab Story 7-8

        My newest mix blares out through my car speakers as I accelerate on the empty road. There's no one around, and I have no idea what the speed limit is, but I see very minimal danger in speeding along a flat, straight, desolate road. I'm still two states away from my domicile. The clock in my car tells me the time: 2:32pm. I haven't eaten since this morning. My stomach remembers and alerts me of it's voraciousness loudly.
        I don't have any food left over from my trip. There's half a pack of bottled water in the back seat, but I don't need to imbibe. I expected to be back home by now. Of course, a fine cuisine isn't going to just appear. I'll have to keep driving. Maybe soon I'll find a town.
        Ten minutes pass, then thirty. Before long, it's been 45 minutes and I'm still on the desolate road. I don't even see any animals around. But wait- there's something up there! Maybe it's a road sign or something. Hopefully it'll show an upcoming Safeway or Subway. As I get closer, however, the black blur seems to take the shape of something much more domestic. A person? No way. There is no way someone could walk along this whole road. It must be a delusion.
        I pull over as I approach the strange maybe-man. He looks like he could use a long ablution, but he doesn't stop walking at the sight of my car. In fact, he seems completely unaware of anything going on around him, in a dormant state. He's tall, much taller than me. His clothing is completely black and covered in dirt. He smells atrocious. Maybe he's a somnambulist.
        "Sir? Are you okay?" I don't get out of my car, but roll along slowly behind him. The man keeps walking. "Hey," I try again, louder. "Do you need some help?" I honk my horn quickly. The man still doesn't move. My stomach growls again, and I remember that I have to be at work tomorrow. It's 3:17 now, and I have a very long way to go. I turn around in my seat and grab three bottles of water. I don't know how I'll get them to the man if he refuses to talk, so I just open my door and place them on the ground. I feel bad for abandoning the man, but I remind myself that I really don't have time for him right now. At least I gave him something potable to drink. 
        I don't look back until I'm about thirty feet in front of where I left the man. I swerve by accident- where did he go? He was right there thirty seconds ago. Maybe I am hallucinating. I have to eat something.
        I finally roll into my driveway, 1am on the clock. I go to open the door, but I'm stopped by something on my doormat. Three empty bottles and a note: "Thanks for the water".

Factoid Friday #3

This essay talks about Plato's ideas about mental illness. Plato' believes that there are two claims. "One is that psychic illness--taken to include moral and mental failings--is the outcome of bodily defectiveness." One of the earliest record of mental instability. 

Gill, C. (2008). The Body's Fault? Plato's Timaeus on Psychic Illness. In Classical and Medieval               Literature Criticism (Vol. 98). Detroit: Gale. (Reprinted from Reason and Necessity: Essays on Plato's Timaeus, pp. 59-84, by M. R. Wright, Ed., 2000, London, England: Duckworth)

Vocab Story

I glance over at my iPod dock. It's 8:34, and I promised myself I'd start my pile of homework an hour ago. My music is blaring through the house. It's okay though, because I'm the only one home. 
After a few more minutes of coaxing myself off my bed, I join my schoolbooks next to my desk. I sigh as I open my psychology textbook. I read a few sentences about inimical diseases to the mind before deciding the only pathology I need to know is that too much homework is mind-numbing. I don't understand any of it. Maybe I could call my friend, Charlotte, and ask, in the most amicable way possible, for every answer we've ever had to know for that class. She'd be enamored if I ran to her for help. Charlotte is a total bibliophile. She reads nonstop and gets every answer right when the teacher calls on her. 
No way will I allow her that complacence. She'd never be able to be pacified. I decide to wait on the psychology and odiously switch over to trigonometry. My antipathy to all things math-related is immeasurable. I don't know why I have to keep up with it. I don't think classifying triangles will get me anywhere in my future line of work: writing. After another few minutes of pretending to work out an answer, it becomes clear that my apathy toward the subject will not allow any work to be finished. 
I decide to pick up To Kill a Mockingbird instead. It's the book my English III class is reading. I'm about 50 pages behind already, and we started it last week. The word on the page appease me more than the numbers in my textbook, so I allow myself to read the fifty pages and crawl into bed. 
I fall asleep remembering that it's Friday and I have the whole weekend to finish everything else. Who am I kidding? That's not getting finished.   

Realism in Paintings

Robert Henri's strong sense of self is portrayed through Portrait of Carl Gustav Waldeck, 1896 as the man stands in a position of power while not being glorified, he gruff facial expression shows his true emotion which was captured by Henri.

Henri's elegant style is shown in The Dancer, 1910, with out exaggerating, an overwhelming amount of class and respect is shown because of her dress and beauty. 

Henri captures pure innocence in his painting The Beach Hat, 1914, a young woman ready to see the world is innocently portrayed with a beach hat on in this oil masterpiece by Robert Henri.

Factoid Friday #2

In 1999, Bill Clinton gave a radio address expressing his concerns with the mental health stigma in America and announced that on the following Monday a new plan to better the lives of the mentally ill would be brought into light. Citation: William J. Clinton: "The President's Radio Address," June 5, 1999. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=57689.