The Perks of Being a Wallflower blog post + movie opinions

               The Perks of Being a Wallflower is an excellent book that became a film a few years ago. I think that the movie was excellent,  being that is had all of the main attributes to the book, and didn;t leave out any important bits. I also like how is didn't undersize the issues that want on in the book, such as depression, abuse, sex, homosexuality, death, suicide, et cetera. The main character, Charlie is a 15 year old boy just starting high school. He is a year older because he was held back a grade when he was emotionally ill after his best friend committed suicide. He is a sensitive boy who now has no friends, until he meets Patrick, Sam, and all of their friends.

             In both the movie and the book, they are pretty much bad kids who smoke a pack a day and do weed and acid. But they are also nice, and smart, courageous and outgoing.  Charlie soon befriends them and falls in love with Sam, a girl with short hair and Patrick's step-sister. Charlie spends the whole book and movie with these people, and dates and dumps their friend Mary Elizabeth. He liked her, but she was always talking, and was a bit bossy. Deep down, he loved Sam, but he didn't show it until a party where he was dared to kiss the prettiest girl in the room. However, he wasn't the only one with relationship problems. His older sister had a boyfriend who she was seeing in secret, because her parents had found out he had hit her. Even though she claimed he wouldn't do it again, he was to never be seen again. He then got her pregnant and cllaimed not to be the father. She got an abortion and they broke up.

             The story ends with Charlie realizing the person he loves most molested him as a child and he is put into another hospital, where he is treated. The final part ends with Charlie and Sam getting back together after her and Patrick go tot college.  This book is heartwarming and heartwrenching at the same time.

Hurricane Song blog post

                 My class recently finished the inspiring book, Hurricane Song by Paul Volponi. The book is about a boy living in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina. The boy's name is Miles, and he recently moved to Louisiana to live with his father, a jazz musician. Miles was not interested in Jazz, and believed that his father loved his instruments more than him. When the hurricane hits Miles, his father and a few of his father's very good friends and fellow jazz musicians are forced into The Superdome, a football stadium, with many other people of low income. They are forced into awful conditions for a couple days, but by the way the book is written, it makes the reader feel like it was  a couple months.
Miles and his father were able to live through deaths, injury, sickness, and so much violence. I believe Miles and his dad were able to live through that because of the music; even though Miles resented it at first.


               At the beginning of hurricane song, Miles asked for football gear for his birthday, something he really wanted and specifically asked for.  Instead he got a drum. In the superdome, he played the that drum, and used it more than any football gear would have. When someone died they played. When gangs were setting fires they played. They brought peoples' hopes up when they were tired and defeated, hungry, thirsty and fatigued. When a man named Cyrus commited suicide they played- together, always together, with Pop (Mile's father) on his horn and Miles on the drum. When Miles and Pop escaped the dome and swam through the floods to Pop's old jazz club, they played. I believe that all of the music kept them going, surviving. I think that if they didn't have that hope, they wouldn't have escaped the dome, and they would have endured much more torture. I'm not saying if you play jazz BOOM your life will get better, but in this scenario, they wouldn't have lived without it.



              All in all, this concludes that Miles and Pop in Hurricane Song survived the storm through music, and hope, all while giving people hope around them, when they had none.

Beautiful Boy in relation to Tweak

         I first read Tweak around six months ago, and realized the true horrors of being a drug addict, and after reading Beautiful Boy it brings you into the world of being related to one. David and Nic take years to battle this disease of addiction that plagued their lives for years after. Nic took many years to recover from his addiction to meth, and it took his father even longer, and one brain explosion. Literally, his head exploded. Nic's addiction affected not only David (Nic's father) but his mother, step mother, step father, grandparents, younger siblings and all of his friends.

         In Beautiful Boy,  Nic is shown at first as a sweet talented, smart boy who gets good grades, is kind to his family and friends, and is, in general, a good kid. Not much of Nic's childhood is shown in Tweak. The small bits that do exist in his book are about his father's previous drug use and his parent's divorce. He shows Jasper and Daisy's childhood (his younger siblings) mostly because they were little when he was still addicted to meth. He describes having great times with them when he was sober, and and them feeling upset when he wasn't. There is one particular scene where Nic steal's Jasper's only eight dollars. This shows that Nic was really willing to give up everything he had, including his younger siblings who loved and adored him so much.

This was not different from David Sheff's book, as David shows Nic breaking into his home, stealing money, forging checks, and doing drugs at night before sleeping in their living room.  The two books end with Nic being sober for two years, relapsing once more, but then finding help immediately. He as not relapsed since, and his family has grown mush closer. And now he and his father have books that are both New York Times bestsellers.

        

Black beauty blog post

              I just started reading the book Black Beauty, a book about a young horse who is mistreated and abused. It is in the first person,  and it helps you respect the horses life. This book makes one think in the mind of a horse, as it really sucks you in to the horses' setting, environment, it lets you feel the horses' pain when he is hurt, and lets you feel his happiness when he is treated with respect.
I am using this book as a mentor text for my Independent Writing Project, because my story is from the point of view of an animal as well. So far, I believe this book is an excellent one.

             In Black Beauty, the main character is a black horse who is just a few years old, at least in the beginning. As he gets older he leaves his mother, his old farm and his master. He shows his master as a kind person, who never hurts him, always feeds him and gives him treats, and speaks to him in a nice way. He moves to a new farm to get used to wearing a saddle, a bridal and a halter. He complains about wearing a bit, a metal rod that goes behind the horses' last molar, and is, apparently, very unpleasant. The first master is kind, however he goes to another farm where the master shoves the bit in his mouth and causes his mouth to bleed. He meets other horses who have had experiences like his, and ones that have been in much worse conditions. I am guessing, based on the blurb in the back of the book, the horse will be moved to a new farm, or multiple other farms where he will be mistreated, then he will ultimately go back to his old ranch.

           I believe the author of Black Beauty wants us to respect animals, or just everyone in general, by showing the horses point of view to its life.

The Road Not Taken bloggy posty

            The poem The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost is about a man in his mid-life, having to make a choice between to roads in his life, then later, wondering what the other road would have held for him, and how it would have changed his life. In the poem, it states that "Two roads diverged in a yellow wood," and that means that there were two choices for him to make, and the yellow wood means that it's fall, which means its probably in the middle/end of his life. This poem show the man looking back by stating that "Two roads diverged in a wood, and I, I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference."

              In the poem it states that "Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim Because it was grassy and wanted wear," this shows that the narrator is choosing which path to choose, and chooses one because less people had traveled on it. The poem says after that that
"Oh, I marked the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way I doubted if I should ever come back." This shows that the narrator wanted to go on the other path, or the other destiny, but decided that he would save it for another day. Again, in the future, or in the fourth stanza he says that "I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I, I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference."

          All and all this shows that the narrator chose one path in life, and decided that he would go the other way one day. the poem indeed shows the man looking back- without regret but more curiosity, and wonders what the other path would have held.

Luna bloggy posty

                I recently finished the heart wrenching book Luna.  The protagonist is a 15 or 16 year old girl with two judgemental parents- and a transsexual brother. The girl, Regan struggles with school, boys, bullying, and protecting her brother, Liam. During the day he is a smart tall, thin senior in high school, smart, handsome, and has girls following him around like he's god.  But that's not what he wants. All he wants is to be a girl, and says he was born into the wrong body. Meanwhile, he dresses like a woman at night, and has named himself Luna. She wakes up Regan in the middle of the night to show her- as Regan is the only one who knows. Regan has always been there for her brother, but now she is struggling to work in school, and has caught the eye of the new kid, Chris, in her science class. In Luna by Julie Anne Peters, Regan goes through a tough year, as she helps her prother transition for good.
                 In Luna,  Regan has flashbacks about her brother as a little kid letting Luna out. He would but nail polish on, ask his mom for barbies makeup and hairbrushes for his birthday and Christmas. They never has any of it. The father was always making Liam look bad by making him try out for sports, and not letting him cook dinner instead of Regan when he was perfectly capable. In the middle of the book, Regan and Luna would slip out at 6 in the morning to go shopping at a mall. Liam's goal was to make no one question that he was a boy, and pretending he can't see people snickering. At the end of the book Liam meets a transsexual and goes to live with her inspired by her braveness. After he tells his family on his eighteenth birthday, his dad practically throws him out of the house, and his mom just couldn't deal with it. He goes to Seattle where he starts therapy and gets ready for his sex-reassignment surgery.
                  I think this book really shows that you should appreciate others for their differences, no matter if they're gay, lesbian, transsexual, it doesn't matter. The moral of the story is you should treat people the way you want to be treated, and accept and love others for their differences- not everyone has to be exactly like you.

Soda Ban blog post

Lucie Pascarosa              705            2/10/13    

                                             Soda ban Essay

Mayor Bloomberg has imposed a soda ban on New York City, proposing to ban sugary drinks over 16 oz. in order to drop obesity rates. Sounds good right? Well, not exactly. The soda ban may seem like it would decrease the obesity rate, but there are way too many loopholes in the law, and it could hurt businesses. One example of a loophole is that you can buy multiple 16 oz. sodas at a time. The government cannot help this loophole, but unfortunately stores not regulated by the government could still sell supersized sodas which means delis and 7/11 will be able to sell (sometimes literally) you buckets of soda legally. The point is, even if you can’t get a 32 oz. soda with your Happy Meal, you can just hop across the street to the 7/11 and buy a Double Gulp, for much less than buying that many 16 oz. sodas would cost. One more reason the ban should not be supported is because it could hurt businesses that depend on large sodas for profit, like fast-food restaurants, and movie theaters. Those are only two of the issues with the ban. The point is, there are way too many loopholes in the ban, and it could actually hurt our community, more than it would help it.

One reason the New York City soda ban should not be supported is because there are too many loopholes. First of all, even though Mayor Bloomberg has banned sodas that are more than 16 oz, really he has banned cups that hold sizes larger than 16 oz. So you can just keep refilling that cup over and over, and the government won’t be able to lift a finger. Now, that is your own personal choice to get fat, which isn’t a good thing, but the government should have figured out a plan with less loopholes of they really want us to drink less soda. Another loophole is less obvious if you have no knowledge on the ban. The ban states that only government regulated restaurants and theaters will be affected by the ban. So if you don’t want to waste money to keep refilling your cup, you will be able to go over to the bodega across the street and get whatever size soda you want. So in reality, the ban will only be a small inconvenience to those who enjoy larger sodas.

Second of all, the soda ban could kill Movie Theater and fast-food businesses because of how much money the fast food business and the movie theaters make off of soda each year. According to rd.com, or Readers Digest, movie theaters make almost all of their money from concession stands- not movie tickets. Movie theaters also make hundreds of thousands of dollars each year from soda, and would lose that much money from the ban when Bloomberg takes away all of that soda away from the menu. The business will be making much less money, especially if they charge cheaper, even when the soda is already over-priced. A soda so often accompanies fast food restaurant’s meals, that cutting most of that soda out of the picture could be disastrous in terms of money. One could think that the govornment wants to make people feel full after one small soda, well the first McDonalds soda was 6.5-7 oz. When sizes were that small, people felt like they were getting too much when they ordered two, so most didn’t. So less people were fat and more people paid less. Then came the jumbo sizes. Bigger sized sodas were designed to make you feel full with one soda that is larger, therefore the company makes more money. As the sizes increased, the less you had to pay for a jumbo soda, and people got fatter. (From the Omnivore’s Dilemma for kids).

There are some potentially beneficial parts to the ban, but they don’t make much sense. Some say that the ban will create an inconvenience for people to buy large sodas at their favorite fast food restaurants, but they can literally go across the street to a convenience store or 7/11 to buy a pint-sized soda. Another argument was that the ban was a really big step for cities across the United States, but because the ban didn’t regulate all restaurants, there is no point in having it. Non-government regulated restaurants, and drinks with 50% or more milk or milk substitute will be exempt. Also, drinks you add your own sugar will also be exempt. Some also say that if it benefits the people, businesses can stand to loose a few extra bucks. Well, not exactly. Along with movie theaters, basketball stadiums will be affected by the ban as well. Think about all of the people who pay more to buy sodas over 16 oz. in those stadiums. A lot right? Like movie theaters, stadiums charge a high price for soda and other concessions. Taking most of their soda away will discourage customers from buying the soda, which is what Bloomberg wants to happen. The thing is, he needs to find a way to balance everything.

All in all, the New York City Soda ban will not be affective because there are too many loopholes, and movie theaters and fast-food companies will loose money. The soda ban will take away one of the main money sources from movie theaters and stadiums in which customers won’t pay as much for sodas. The other loophole is that non-government regulated stores will not be affected by the ban, therefore, you can still buy gallon sodas. The big picture is, the New York City soda ban will fail, and all of the money Mr. Bloomberg spent on the law will be wasted.