Final Bloggy...

 To be completely honest, blogging has been pretty fun! It definitly fits in more with the times, seeing as everyone I know is a part of some online social network. Be it facebook, twitter, or a blog. It's a lot more fun than just having to turn in papers. I also enjoyed reading other students' blogs as well.
 Unfortunately, I don't think I'll continue to blog for two reasons. One, none of my friends blog.. The closest thing my friends do to blogging is maintaining a twitter account. Also, I think that compared to other online thought sharing pages, blogs (or at least blogger) is kind of limited. No straight from your phone picture posts and no iphone application.
I'm totally into reading blogs though. I was recently flipping through the pages of an InStyle magazine and there was a whole 5 page spread about lots of different blogs that the magazine reviewed and wanted to share with their readers. The spread was organized into categories. Ones about music, fashion, baking, and even blogs that are devoted to finding good online deals. I sit in front of a computer for 9 hours Monday through Friday and blogs are way more entertaining than tabloid websites like TMZ..  

Last words.. Bossy Betty, upgrade to a Twitter!

mmMmmMmm...

Do you like seafood?! Cause I do! Seafood is my weakness and an awesome place to get some is a spot called the Boiling Crab. The food there is consistently fresh and the prices are awesome. Okay so here’s how it works, you choose the type of seafood you want to eat; they’ve got crabs galore, shrimp, crawfish, clams, and oysters. Then you decide just how hungry you are because you order by the pound. Seasoning comes next. My personal favorite is the Rajun Cajun but if that doesn’t tickle your fancy they’ve also got lemon pepper and garlic butter. For you indecisive folks go for the whole sha-bang. Minutes after your order goes in, a server will come by your table carrying a metal bucket… yes a bucket. He or she will pull out of said bucket a clear plastic bag filled with whatever you ordered and plop it down onto your wax paper covered table. Break open the bag and have at it. Watch out for the steam though! By the way, they don’t do utensils. If you aren’t into getting messy they also offer tamer dishes like seafood gumbo over rice (fork included) or regular old fish and chips. Bomb fish and chips! Five fillets of fresh catfish and a side of Cajun fries that’ll only set you back $8. The atmosphere is chill, plenty of flat screen t.v.’s mounted on the walls broadcasting any sporting events taking place at the moment and despite the high volume of customers the staff is always friendly and attentive. The one problem about Boiling Crab though is despite having five or six locations; the closest one is in Alhambra. But if you happen to be going in that direction, or are down for the drive, definitely hit it up. Bring some friends, throw on your bib, roll up your sleeves and dig in! Oh, and bring a sharpie..

FFN .. FTW!

    One of the things that reading Fast Food Nation has prompted me to do is spread the word. Everytime I read a crazy fact or got through a gross story, I would feel the urge to tell a friend.. or group of friends. My intention was only to make the people around me aware of the things I learned but was previously oblivious to. This back fired on me one night while my friends and I were hanging around talking. I had just finished reading 'What's in the Meat' and after telling them about what I read, they decided that we should play a game in which whomever lost the game would have to eat a hot dog. Needless to say, I ended up the loser in more ways than one. I've been a fan of hot dogs but after having just read that section, it made the hot dog so much harder to swallow..literally.
    Because fast food already isn't something I'm a fan of, that aspect of  book hasn't really had an affect on me. I think the end of the book, reading about the meat-packing industry, is what hit home. Although I don't eat tons of meat, I do enjoy a burger every once in a while. Reading about the practices in the industry has made me sick to my stomach. Now I'm faced with the dilemma of how I can still continue to consume meat products without taking into consideration all the things I've learned reading the book. I know I won't become a vegetarian, so as of now, the only thing I've found is to come up with is to buy grass-fed free-range WAY MORE EXPENSIVE beef and chicken. Unfortunately not everyone has that option, so I strongly feel that it is up to the government and those greedy politicians to stop operating with their own interest in mind and start doing what they promised to do when they took office which is do whatever was in the best interest of the American people. The United States one of the most powerful countries on the planet and if other countries can implement changes to improve the practices of their meat-packing industry, why can't we?!

how's it...

On the subject of college as a whole, I’ve figured out that if you don’t want to be here, you’re better off staying away. For a while, I was only going to school because I was obligated to. My parents put pressure on me to go despite the fact that I had no desire to be there and no idea what I wanted to go to school for. I went only to please them and this of course resulted in less than desirable grades. It’s something that I have to deal with now that I’ve got my head on straight and know what I want to accomplish. College is tough enough and putting roadblocks up for yourself makes things much harder.  

This semester of school so far hasn’t been too bad; I enjoy my professors, my classmates, and the classes I’m taking. I’ve always heard professors tell their students to make friends with one another and exchange phone numbers but it was never something I did because I didn’t think it would be of any benefit to me. I gave that a shot and found that it really does help. I have people I can contact when I’m not sure about something going on in class and when they call me with questions its an opportunity for me to review class material also. Coming to realize that professors are just regular people who happen to teach has made things a lot easier as well. Before, I was always kind of afraid to talk to professors because I was really intimidated by them. Now that I’ve stopped kind of putting them on some pedestal, they’ve become more approachable. Because I work full-time, I’m not a full time student, the workload isn’t terrible, but finding a way to balance everything has been a bit of a challenge for me.

One problem I have is my tendency to procrastinate. My professors give me plenty of time to work on assignments but I always find myself doing them at the last minute. Although I do wait until the last minute to get my assignments done I have decent grades in my classes and seeing that made me realize that taking more time to do my work will result in higher scores and ultimately very good grades. This is something that I struggle with on a regular basis and is something that I have to get over soon. College only gets harder and developing some discipline when it comes to school work will make things easier in the long run.

tell me the truth..

1) I'm the oldest child in my family
2) Surfing one afternoon, I got pulled out too far and had to be rescued by other surfers, twice
3) I love watching soap operas
4) I play video games every night before bed
5) As a child, I lived a block away from an active volcano .. it erupted
6) I broke my arm snowboarding

a tribe called quest...

In 1985, Rappers Q-Tip, Jarobi White, Ali Shaheed Muhammad, and DJ Phife Dawg got together to form A Tribe Called Quest, arguably the greatest hip hop group to date. I first heard their music blaring out of my older brother’s bedroom when I was in elementary school and I’ve been a fan ever since… I seriously listen to their music almost everyday. Q-Tip’s distinctive voice and the group’s mellow yet intelligent flows seem to always put me in a good mood. Earlier this year I caught wind of a tour the group was going to be on and I had to be there. I couldn’t pass up on the chance to see them perform live. Rock the Bells 2010 was the tour and for the Los Angeles show, there were 20,000 people in attendance. A friend of mine came along, even though he didn’t know too much about them and together, we managed to get about rows away from the front of the stage. Once their set started and the first beat dropped, the whole crowd, me included, went nuts. Getting to see them live lets me cross one thing off my bucket list. During their performance, Q-Tip came off the stage and walked through the crowd. He was no more than two feet away from me. That experience further solidified them as the greatest rap group of all time… at least to me!

Electirc Relaxation

Q-Tip & Phife Dawg @ Rock The Bells

bilingual learning...

I would like to chime in on the issue of bilingual learning. Although I don’t have anything against it, but I do think that there have to be major changes made before being integrated into our school systems. As an immigrant of the United States, I was evaluated upon enrollment of elementary school for possibly having to participate in a program similar to this. But because my native language is Tagalog and not Spanish, had I not passed, I would’ve been placed in a class with students that have learning disabilities. When I was in the Philippines, I went to school on a military base and was taught in English so I had no problem. Unfortunately, not all immigrant children get that opportunity and do end up in classes with students with disabilities. In my opinion, placing perfectly capable students in remedial classes could stunt their learning. This could also discourage students and give them the impression that they also have learning disabilities rather than a language barrier. The fact that a student isn’t fluent in English is not a mental disability! I’ve also heard of situations where students get held back a grade because of the language issue. Since then, I’ve always had a negative outlook on the bilingual learning programs at schools. I just think that if Spanish speaking students are going to be taken into consideration, so should every other bilingual student. Also, I’ve sat in on a few of those bilingual learning classrooms and have noticed that it’s far from bilingual. It’s more like a Spanish speaking classroom sprinkled with a bit of English. How are students in this program supposed to eventually transition to regular classes if they are enabled to stick to their native tongue? So, I’m all the best interest of students but it should be for all students, and done right.