My music taste fluctuates a lot, and I’m constantly finding new songs to play on repeat until I hate them. Here are the songs I’ve been playing nonstop for the past week or so.
Tend the Garden by Gang of Youths
This song has such beautiful music, and it’s pretty sad. I mean, that’s to be expected from Gang of Youths; they did also make the song Achilles Come Down. Like Achilles Come Down, it’s a narrative, and it’s sang from the perspective of a father who presumably did something horrible and won’t ever forgive himself for having to leave his children. It’s a really poetic song and there’s a good amount of fairly obscure Biblical references, so if you’re into that kind of thing, definitely give it a listen. (Or a million listens, like I’ve done.)
This song is so fun to listen to. The music is a perfect blend of upbeat and chill. Joji has such a beautiful voice, too. It’s a really sweet love song and isn’t really sad. Good to listen to if you’re just looking for good vibes.
This song is totally different from the other two, but it’s so good. It’s basically another version of Black Beatles by Rae Sremmurd. The rhymes in it are super clever. If you like artists like cupcakKe, Megan Thee Stallion, and Cardi B, you’ll probably like this song.
Those are my favorite songs right now. They definitely all have very different vibes, but I listen to all of them all the time. I hope if you check them out, you like them too!
So, as of right now my test results haven’t come back, but I’m pretty sure I have covid. My mom and dad both came back positive when they were tested, and seeing as I have been quite sick over the last week I’m pretty damn sure its covid. My mom is holding out hope that I’m negative so I can go to school, but I’m less optimistic. The actual sickness hasn’t been all that bad most of the time. The worst part for me are the headaches and the dizziness. Plus I’ve had these weird things I call “brain shocks” that I normally get when I miss my meds. I really don’t know how to describe them other than brain shocks. Thats like what they are, they suck ass though. When I was taking a different medication, Pristyq, they would get so bad that I would blink and get them. They suck, a lot. Anyway, I’m hoping I can go to school soon but I kinda doubt it. I probably won’t be back till next week, which sucks because I’m gonna get behind in AP chem and that is not good at all. Luckily it gives me more time to work on my research paper for english that I still have not finished. Anyway, long story short, don’t get covid, its not a vibe.
What is the point of shielding children from the more “negative” parts of life? For my entire life, I have never been able to wrap my head around why some people decide to actively shield their kids from discovering for figuring out more “adult” aspects of life. I’m not saying that every parent should give their kid a copy of Grand Theft Auto or Doom at age five as I have seen firsthand how that affects certain people. I believe that there is a perfect balance of what information a kid can take in as they grow up.
This balance varies greatly from person to person, but even if some kids can take more than others, it’s better to just let them find out on their own and have a real conversation about what it is than flat out blocking them from finding out. The second that a parent tells kids not to do something and doesn’t give a very good reason of why they shouldn’t do it, the kid is going to become curious and want to do it anyways. If a kid finds out what something is or even experiences it, there’s no point in lying about it. The kid already has an idea of what it is, and if you won’t tell them you can bet the internet will. It’s far better to just be honest and give the tools that the kid needs to be safe and educated about all these new things they’re learning.
What many parents don’t realize is that kids are growing up with a digital web that can get them what they want when they want it without anyone knowing, and if the kids aren’t taught how to navigate all of this with a level head, they could find themselves in a dangerous situation. At the end of the day, kids have free will that is just as strong as any adults, they will learn about life with or without the help of an adult mentor.
I recently became my school’s varsity soccer goalie and was super excited for my first game. 5 minutes in, I got shat on. The other team’s striker shot a huge floater from outside the box. I saw the ball coming and thought I could get to it with ease. As I saw the ball floating in, I sheepishly backed up letting the ball hit the net above my head.
What a bummer.
I needed to have a good performance to guarantee the starting job and that is NOT what that accomplished.
PC: Shutterstock
The helpless feeling of the ball floating over my head. The swish sound of the ball hitting the net. The collective sigh of our fans and players. I heard and felt it all. I punted the ball out of the net disgusted with myself. Heading back to the bench I put on a show, slamming my gloves into the ground, taking off my shirt, throwing my shin pads. I could feel the judgment from players who were complacent in the goal and wanted to tell them to chill out, in fact, when one teammate gave me a glare and said something to me I just said “please shut up”.
Anyway, I have a game today and am hoping for better performance.
Philosophy seems distant from young children, but early exposure to philosophy and philosophical thinking can benefit children’s future development.
A lot of times, kids can come up with questions that are hard to answer, like “What is space?” “What is right and wrong?”.
Obviously, we can’t explain Einstein’s theory of time relativity to them when they ask what is the meaning of time. These questions are mostly either involving too many different concepts, or there is simply no absolutely right answer. This is when philosophical thinking comes into play, children can learn and develop their own answers.
By learning various concepts, children can improve in academic learning and form a more organized understanding of the world.
Some people may argue that it is too early for children to start “thinking about thinking” or it could be overwhelming. And yes, it is a possibility. Philosophy for children doesn’t need to include obscure terminology or deep philosophical history. Basic themes like Logicism and elementary ethics are enough and comprehensible for elementary or middle school students.
French students are required to learn philosophy in the last year of secondary school. Educational systems around the world should consider adding philosophy to the curriculum.
Over the summer, I had one homework assignment for AP Psychology. It was to read Forty Studies That Changed Psychology and write two paragraph summaries for ten of the forty studies that caught my eye. In normal fashion, I read only ten of the studies and wrote the paragraphs the night before the due date. One of the studies that caught my eye was a study called Masculine or Feminine … or Both? that explored gender in psychology and proposed the idea that instead of masculinity and feminity being measured separately based on sex, they would be two variables on the same graph. Not only did this study introduce the idea of androgyny, but it also completely changed how psychologists studied gender.
The study was done by a professor who gave her students a list of positive attributes and asked her them which ones she felt were desirable to the opposite sex. This made it so that it strictly abided by gender norms in society. She then took the list and turned it into a test in which different attributes were listed with an “agree-disagree” spectrum with masc attributes contributing as negative variables and femme contributing as positive variables. She then made scoring guidelines: anyone -.05 or under was on the masc spectrum, anyone 0.5 or over was on the femme spectrum, and if the score ranged from -0.49-0.49, the person would then be considered “androgynous”.
In 1974, this was one of the most progressive gender studies in human history as it suggested that gender attributes weren’t exactly tied to sex. However, this study was done in 1974, not only have gender studies come a long way, but some of the research methods are outdated. For example, the attributes that are labeled “masculine” or “feminine” are only based on hetero-normativity and do not consider same-sex or other forms of attraction. Although it is likely a lot of the attributes will stay the same, some might change which is very important if something like this is to be measured. Then there’s the possibility that androgyny as a measurement of gender is outdated as well.
I’m not saying that we should all remove androgyny from our vocabularies altogether, as it is a good adjective for someone who has physical attributes of both sexes. What I do think, is that it limits psychological studies of gender as it still somewhat adheres to the idea that there are only two real classifications/identifications of gender. Realistically, a study such as this is really more useless than anything. In today’s world, there are so many gender identifications such as non-binary that completely exclude masculinity and femininity altogether. It might even be better to exclude gender identification in psychology altogether as it is extremely difficult to study something that has an actively growing number of variables.
Recently there have been some games that have been released or partially released to those who pre-ordered them. Some of the primary games in this category are Call of Duty Vanguard and Battlefield 2042. There are some other games that have come out recently but these are the big two in my personal opinion.
(these are in no particular order of how much I like the game)
First off is Call of Duty Vanguard, this game is a classic Cod (Cod is call of duty for short) it has the basic ideas that show up in most Cods. These characteristics include similar game modes and attachment addons. Gamemodes are as follows Free for all, team deathmatch, capture point, and search and destroy. I look at most Cods as of recently is the Developers just gave the previous game a new coat of paint and called it good, making it not one of my top choices for games.
Image Credit: Forbes
The next game I want to talk about is Battlefield 2042. Battlefield is a first-person shooter or fps for short like Cod but it has its own unique quirks and game modes. To start Battlefield has 3 primary game modes, one is called conquest, in this game mode, you and your team are tasked with controlling as many points on the map as possible while the enemy has the exact same goal making it a fight to the death over point control. The second is called Breakthrough, in this game mode, you and your team have to take points in a consecutive order making your way through the map, because of the points needing to be taken in a certain order it creates more of a centered combat area as opposed to Conquest where it’s just everyone running around. The final game mode is called Hazard zone and it is quite the new idea for the Battlefield franchise. In Hazard zone, you and your team of four are dropped somewhere on the map and are tasked with collecting data drives and extracting via a helicopter to earn in-game currency. Overall Battlefield is built to withstand the abuse that players with put it through because of this it is not made once a year like Call of Duty making the Battlefield games feel more polished.
So ya boi was driving to get lunch during his robotics meet, and basically he slid out and hit a pole. He all good tho so like we chillin but the car is not chillin. There was a lot of oil and transmission fluid leaking and power steering fluid all over the place. But it might not be super bad because the side that hit the pole is the one with all the fluid tanks so I guess we’ll see.
Technically the computer isn’t in my backpack (because I’m typing on it currently) but I packed it this morning so it counts. I have a either 2017 or 2018 (not sure) MacBook Air and it’s covered in stickers. My charger is also in my backpack. It’s the old kind that attaches magnetically and it’s kinda wide.
I always have my main binder in my backpack because I keep most of my papers in there. I have dividers for each subject and an extra for my English essays. The binder is green and it’s like 2 inches thick I think.
My Spanish Binder
I have a separate binder for Spanish because my teacher requires it. It’s purple and an inch and a half thick.
My Subject Notebooks
The academic classes I have today are journalism, math, and Spanish. I also have my chemistry notebook because I’m gonna do the homework during my study hall. My journalism notebook is purple, my math one is orange, my Spanish one is blue, and my chemistry one is yellow. I’m aware that my color choices might be controversial. Honestly, I just randomly assigned the colors at the beginning of the year. I kinda regret that choice now, but I deal with it.
My Pencil Pouch
My beloved pencil pouch has seen all of high school with me. One of my mom’s friends gave it to me in eighth grade. I keep a phone charger, hand lotion, chapstick, pencil lead, a fidget toy that’s a stick with glitter in it, a bit of trash, a Sharpie, an eraser, several black pens, lots of colored pens, a few highlighters, and my one favorite mechanical pencil in it. It’s pretty nifty.
My Glasses
I have reading glasses that are blue-light blockers. The frames are dark blue and white. They’re RayBan.
I always bring some manga with me if I know I have a free block or study hall and don’t have a ton of work to do. I’m working on volumes 7 and 24 right now. I have about 11 My Hero Academia manga and these are the last two I haven’t finished yet. I’m looking forward to getting more manga for Christmas.
My trusty TI-84 Plus CE always stays in my backpack. I’ve had it since last year. It’s the rose gold edition.
Here’s a random picture I found of the same kind of calculator I have.
Tissues
I have tissues in my backpack because you never know what could go down at school. By that I mean getting a nosebleed or having a bad allergy day.
Some Candy That’s Literally Over Two Months Old
I’m not kidding. I have several packs of M&Ms from the first day of school when all the students got candy thrown at them. I wonder if they’re still intact or if they’ve melted and re-solidified too many times for them to be recognizable.
Some #2 Non-Mechanical Pencils
You never know if you’ll completely forget that you have a huge standardized test, so I have some #2 non-mechanical pencils just in case. I’m always ready to take a PSAT.
A Dinosaur Pop It
He’s a T-Rex and he’s rainbow colored. I got him in France over the summer for like €5. Pretty good deal. He’s very precious to me.
My Rescue Inhaler
I have asthma so I carry a rescue inhaler with me just in case. It’s the blue kind.
A Little Bag of Crystals
Gotta keep the vibes good.
My Afternoon Medication
I take the quick release for my ADHD meds around 2pm. I keep the pill in a little pill holder I got in Barcelona. It has a Gaudí lizard on it.
An Extra Mask
Just in case.
My AirPods
So I don’t get bored during my free block or have to be the person listening to the assignment out loud. They have a turquoise case.
A Cliff Bar
I get hungry sometimes. I like the original chocolate chip kind.
A Pair of Earrings – I Was Wondering Where Those Were
While checking my backpack to make sure I didn’t miss anything, I found my India agate crystal earrings. I haven’t seen those for a few weeks now. Glad I know where they are now.
They’re shaped like this except they’re earrings and they’re dark green.
For this week’s blog, I’m going to discuss my take on the animals I could fight and win, but I like Pokemon and so I’m going to talk about the Pokemon I could beat in a fight. These are just fictional animals and they can use special attacks, I’m just going to set the baseline as just treating them like an animal fighting me not something that can blow me up (for obvious reasons).
To begin, let’s start with an obvious win, Klefki.
This is Klefki, its a sentient set of keys that floats. I’ll lead off with the fact that it’s a key chain what is it gonna do, if I had to fight it I’d just grab it by the keyring and shake it around like a ragdoll. This is an obvious win for me 100% of the time.
Next is a so so win-loss ratio
This is Ditto it’s a Pokemon that can morph into anything it sees, so for example it could morph into me and have the same “stats” as myself. The reason this is a toss-up for a win or a loss is that it can turn into me, I just don’t know if I would win in a fight against myself or if it would even turn into me and create me vs me situation. I’m going to give this a 50-50 chance that I would win.Next is Darmanitan its a fire Pokemon that is 4’3″ so it’s shorter than me but it weighs 204 lb so it’s much heavier than me. I see this fight as a 100% loss for me as it is a giant fire gorilla that could definitely kick my ass in a fight. My tactic for this fight would be to attempt to get it to hurt itself but I really doubt that I could dodge this thing. Second, to last is one of my favorite pokemon Marshadow, this Pokemon is a ghost fighting type. This Pokemon would kick my ass about 70% of the time because it is a ghost, the other 30% of the time I could totally beat it because it’s only 2’4″ tall and it weighs 48 lb. In the situation that I am able to make contact with it, I’d just punt the little thing as hard as I could launching it into space like team rocket (example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ib084tzN8H0 – credit: Quilifai on youtube). In the event where I go to kick it and my foot goes straight through it, I’m quite so fucked like there is nothing that I can do at all, that’s my reasoning for my win-loss ratio.
Finally Zoroark, this Pokemon comes in at 5’3″ and weighs 178 lb, and is known as the illusion Pokemon. Personally, I look at this fight as a toss-up because I think that I might be able to beat this Pokemon by just straight-up fighting it. I feel like its size and weight puts it in a lower weight class than me making this one pretty even. I do think that the size of these Pokemons arms is quite lacking compared to mine. Im going to give this fight a 50% win-loss ratio.
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