Category: journalism

Team Rest

callmemaybe32Leave a comment

This weekend was the first time since the start of the season that our team did not have a game.

This is not because one was not scheduled, but because simply we could not compete against Orcutt Academy’s team.

We are a team that defies odds, beginning a season with a mere 20 players in a collision sport.

Players are bound to get injured, and starting with a number that low doesn’t put us in the best position.

Regardless of size, we are a team who trains to compete, to show what we are made of, and even if we don’t always win, to show we will not go down without a fight.

Read More »

Richard Dawkins

smackyjackjackLeave a comment

I have three heroes.

One of them, Julian Assange, I have already blogged about.

My second hero is Richard Dawkins.

Richard Dawkins is an evolutionary biologist who has become the spearhead of the atheist and humanist movements. His best selling book, The God Delusion, states that not only is God not real, but a belief in a supernatural creator is a delusion.

As an evolutionary biologist, Dawkins has the job of explaining how it is that people made it in to existence. Because he does this in a logical and intelligent way, he gets hassled by some of my favorite people; religious people.

Dawkins has been featured on many shows, including Real Time with Bill Maher, defending his stance on religion. If there is one thing that Dawkins knows how to do, its deal with religious people.

Religion is one of my favorite topics. It baffles me that some (well, a lot) of people can believe in such nonsense. Dawkins does an extraordinary job of telling the truth. This is why he is my hero. Truth is the one thing that cannot be hidden forever, and Dawkins is merely one of the people showing the lies for what they are. All of this has been done by one old, badass, biologist.

dawk

South America Bound, Jack Marcus’s Journey to Chile

callmemaybe32Leave a comment

South America Bound!.

^^^^^Here is a great blog from a very close friend of mine.

I have known Jack since we were younger, but we became close friends my freshman year of high school.

I am also close to his younger brother Peter, and we spent many great days and nights together.

I am incredibly proud to have a friend who has the guts to pack up and go to a country where he can’t really speak the language, and leave all major civilization for nine months to be in Patagonia.

File:Cuernos del Paine from Lake Pehoé.jpg

This isn’t his first adventure out of the country alone, his sophomore year he spent a semester in Israel, learning Hebrew, and embracing the life of a jew in Israel.

He loved living in Israel, and while Israel and Chile are very different places, I am sure Jack will love it.

Jack is not known for speaking Spanish, really, he doesn’t at all, and when he does it provokes a good laugh.

Although I have been unable to spend time with him in the past few months, I will be thinking about him through his journey, and hope to go visit him at some point in South America along his journey.

I will keep him in my thoughts, and hope all goes well.

I am sure when he gets back he will have plenty to tell, and hopefully some pictures.

While you cannot read this Jack, stay safe and have fun, we will be thinking about you back at home!

I am sure you will spread your odd humor and good vibes to all the people you are with.

Adios Hermano!

Defeated Again

callmemaybe32Leave a comment

Once I again I walked off of another teams field not feeling the great feeling of victory

This past weekend the team traveled up to Los Olivos, CA to compete against the Dunn Earwigs on their parents weekend, just as we did last year.

We went into the game with high hopes, and a new play series that we had worked on all week.

We arrived at the school, and right of the bat the day was not going as planned.

Somehow the ball bag was left back at school, some 2 hours away.

We did not have our own game balls, or our own kicking tee.

We put that aside and made do, and went into our pre game routine of bananas, pretzels, and stretching.

Our Defensive Coordinator John Wickenhaeuser had dome some research that bananas and pretzels before a game does the body good if that comment seemed a little odd.

During our warm ups that same nauseous feeling returned, and I was once again off my game.

I even tried to take medicine to make this feeling go away, but it is clear that it is nerves, and I just need to be hit a few times so that I don’t think about it as much.

When the game started Dunn quickly scored their first touchdown, and we weren’t too worried, that happens in the game of football.

Read More »

Rain Rain, Please Don’t Go Away

callmemaybe32Leave a comment

It finally rained the other day .

After having so many hot days, I was really ready for the weather to cool down, and to let the water fall from the sky.

There was talk of rain over last weekend weekend, and in the beginning of the week, and I was skeptical that it would actually happen.

There was between a 20-40 percent chance, but with less than 50% chance, the earth still made it happen.

Thursday started off clear and I was worried that this one rainy day was going to be just a cold day, where I was looking to the sky hoping for rain.

Soon enough it began to rain a little after noon.

I was standing outside and felt a light drizzle.

I returned back indoors and just as the door shut behind me, it is as if the skies opened and the heavens rained down upon the ground.

Read More »

Change Pending (Except at the ATMs): Obama in LA

smackyjackjack1 Comment

Last Sunday I went and saw Barack Obama speak at the Nokia Theater in LA.  There weren’t really many other people preforming or speaking other than Los Angeles’ Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, San Antonio’s Mayor Julian Castro, George Clooney, Earth Wind and Fire, Jennifer Hudson, Katy Perry, Jon Bon Jovi and Stevie Wonder.

My big shirt and I at the rally

So, let’s try to do this succinctly.

Musically, Bon Jovi…was Bon Jovi (not a good thing), and Stevie Wonder…was Stevie Wonder (good thing).

Okay, now on to why I’m actually writing. Let’s go down the list of the three keynote speakers.

Antonio Villaraigosa came out looking like a promoter for San Manuel Indian Casino. His tie-less suit and unbuttoned top three buttons on his shirt made him fit right in with the LA crowd that was at the Nokia theater that night. But Villaraigosa swallowed his obvious bitterness about speaking before Julian Castro and gave a short speech to introduce the next acts and discuss his allegiance to president Obama. He threw his support behind Obama and welcomed everyone to the fund bolstering night that I was looking forward to.

Read More »

Family Guy/Seth MacFarlane

callmemaybe32Leave a comment

For years this cartoon has been enchanting the homes of those young and old.

This show first aired on January 31, 1999.

File:Family Guy Logo.svg

I feel like I have watched this show since birth, and while this is not true, I have seen every episode, all 190 of them.

When this show first aired I was two and a half years old, so i don’t think it was exactly appropriate for me to watch it at that age.

Family guy is a hilarious adult cartoon created by the wonderful mind of Seth Macfarlane.

Family Guy may be MacFarlane’s most famous piece, but he has done many other shows such as “American Dad!” and the “Cleveland Show“.

He has is also a fantastic vocalist, and just recently put out is first feature length film, “Ted“.

Here MacFarlane can be heard doing the voice of Ted.

Read More »

Defeated by the Indians

callmemaybe32Leave a comment

 

While many of us were feeling hopeful going into our first night game under the lights, it did not turn out how we had hoped.

The team gathered in the locker room 5 hours before kick off to prepare for the close to 3 hour road trip over Highway 33 into Maricopa.

We all put on the lower half of our pads and so that when we walked off the bus we could get right into our pre game warm ups.

The bus ride was filled with many people sleeping, listening to music, and having a good time.

The team has not played a game under the lights for a while, so seeing lights on a field was pretty exciting.

While it was not a huge stadium, it was still a stadium none the less.

Seeing as we arrived about an hour early we spent some time running around on the field to get accustomed to the grass, and pass the ball around, having a good time, smiles could be seen on all of our faces.

At about 6 pm we all entered the final stage of game mode.

We quit the messing around, grabbed our bags, and walked over to a covered area to finish dressing and spend time thinking about our assignments, and what we wanted this game to be like.

It was almost completely silent as we all helped each other grab straps on our pads, and get pumped for the game.

After we were all ready we lined up in two lines, two men across, holding hands, and walking out in complete silence, as one well oiled machine.

Read More »

Mac Miller

callmemaybe32Leave a comment

After over a year of waiting one of my favorite musical artists was finally playing near me.

 Before school started I was just surfing the web, looking for some concerts I may want to go to this year, and there were a few, but none that got my attention as much as “Mac Miller at the Santa Barbara Bowl.”

I immediately called my friends who shared the same interest in Mac Miller, and we made the decision to purchase our tickets well in advance to make sure that we were at this concert that we had been waiting for for so long.

It may seem weird to be so excited about a musician coming, but Mac, being so young and new, usually only played small shows close to his hometown of Pittsburgh, PA.

Every once in a while Mac and his crew ventured out to the west coast, but still not anywhere I could have gotten to easily.

This past Saturday was the day we had all been waiting for.

Finally, my friends and I were going to see Mac Miller, and it was everything I had wished it to be.

For those of you who don’t know Mac Miller or “Malcom James McCormick is an up and coming rap sensation.

At the age of 15 Mac knew he was going to make it in the music industry, and so he did.

Back then he went by “EZ Mac” instead of Mac Miller, but none the less, still a great rapper.

Mac released his first mix tape in 2007 at the age of 15 called “Mackin’ Ain’t Easy” and from there went on to producing his most current album, “Blue Slide Park.”

Read More »

Moving Forward

callmemaybe321 Comment

After the OVS football team came home with an outstanding victory in Lee Vining, that winning streak did not continue this past Saturday.

After our return we had a week to prepare for our next game against Hillcrest Christian of Thousand  Oaks, California. During this week practice seemed to be filled with not only focused faces and hard work, but excitement and laughter after the team had just broken a new Ojai Valley School record of being the first team to win a varsity football game.

It seemed that the win may have gotten to the heads of some players, myself included, and that if we beat that team, that we would probably be able to carry that win into the next game.

Although the game did not put another W on the Ojai Valley School’s standings it did teach the team a valuable lesson, a lesson our coaches were trying to instill in us all week.

Yes we won, but that is just one game, and that while we should be happy we won, there was still plenty of work. In practice Coach D said that yes we did play well, but we need to be better, the word better was repeated over, and over, and over, but apparently in this game our opponent ended up with the better score, which means, they won.

While many of us wanted to walk off of the field with our heads down, we had to keep them up, and come back to our next game playing even better than the first and second.

This past loss has given the team a reality check that while we did play well the first game, and this is not to say we did not play well on Saturday, that we do indeed need to be better.

Our next game is Saturday night against the Maricopa Indians.

This game will be very special for the team because we get to play in the Indian’s stadium arena at night under the lights.

This next coming week of practice is going to be tough, but it will only give us more time to sharpen our minds, and sharpen our plays, because come Saturday it will hopefully be time to put another win up on the boards for this team of new records.

Hopefully we can show everyone that we do deserve to play, and shatter the harsh words that some put on OVS football, like the program should be cancelled because “we aren’t good.”

To all of the people who doubt our team or speak I’ll of us, I ask you to come out and try to do what we do everyday, and see after that what you think about the fact that we aren’t good or that we don’t deserve to play.

If you have to win all the time to be worth it, than sports would not be what they are, nobody would ever win because everyone would be just as good as the other. And if we are to follow in this thought that winning is the only reason to play, than nobody would be able to play because winning would become impossible.

Empty Stadium

If any of you would like to know what it is like to go through what a football team goes through together, I beg you to come out on to the field everyday, put on your helmet and pads, run around in the heat, get beaten and battered, and then return from a loss, and hear, “wow who could have seen that coming,” in a sarcastic tone.

Hopefully we can better ourselves from this game and have the season of all seasons. If you can come out and support at any of our games it would be greatly appreciated. And to all of you who doubt us I really hope we can change your minds at some point, and if not try and keep it to yourself.