Saltena's Blog

Chris McCandless being me

saltena — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 17:53:16 +0000

If I was Chris McCandless and I ran away, I would definitely head south. I would want to be in the warm climate where I have a better chance of survival. I would try to hop trains like Chris or hitchhike rides to get to somewhere around California or Colorado. I would try and make a new life down there. If I had to pick a new name I would probably pick Mick, in honor of my grandpa. I would try and roam around and get a job somewhere where I can make enough money to rent out a small apartment for myself. If I would ever run away I don’t think I would do it like Chris is doing. I would want to make another life, and make sure I’m staying healthy and I can survive. I feel like Chris is okay with just wandering around meeting new people and then walking out of their lives again. I wouldn’t want to do that. I would like to find a nice place to live out on the west coast and just start a new life. I would still want to live in a society where all the rules of “life” still apply. I think it would be fun to be living on my own in a different place where I don’t know anyone and basically start all over making new friends, trusting people, and finding a sufficient way to make money. It would be a challenge that not many people would look forward to, but I think it would be fun and fascinating. I think one of the hardest parts for me would be just to make it there. I wouldn’t be very comfortable having to hitchhike rides with people whom I don’t know what they’re planning on doing. Even hopping trains would be difficult just because the risk if you get caught like Chris almost did would always be in the back of my mind. Another thing that would be difficult for me would be to leave my family behind. I know Chris didn’t have too great of a relationship with his parents, but that’s not the same for me. It would be very hard to walk out of all my good friend’s lives and especially my family’s lives. I think just like Chris’ family my parents would have tried to have people looking for me, but my family would probably expect me to go to the west coast if I would ever run away. It would be fun to get away I think for a while, but I would end up missing my family and friends too much and would end up somehow getting myself back to Fort Wayne. It would be a great experience to be able to get out on my own and try to survive depending only on myself for everything. Chris’ ultimate journey would have a lot of differences between mine, but in the end I think he’s got a good idea on how he wants to live his life, on his own.

Chris McCandless and Zines

saltena — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 18:07:31 +0000

Chris McCandless, the main character in Into the Wild, I think is a very selfish person. Chris just gets up and leaves Atlanta without telling his parents or anyone where he will be or how to reach him. It’s fine to go on a journey that you have wanted to do your whole life, but at least let the people who care about you know where you will be so they won’t worry. When McCandless is on the road hitchhiking he meets these nice people who give him food and clothes and are very nice to him, he still gets up and leaves them when he feels it’s time to move on. I think what McCandless is doing is great, he’s for filling his life goal of wanting to get away and go to Alaska. I do think though that Chris struggles obviously with his survival skills out in the wild. I think if he would have taken more time to prepare for this trip and actually make sure he has the right tools to survive in anything nature throws at him then he would have an easier time making it from place to place. He is at a good age where his body can take most of this, but I don’t feel he brought enough supplies with him to last. He is a smart kid, he just doesn’t know everything you need to know about surviving in the wild. Chris also seems arrogant, in a way that he keeps saying he can handle whatever the outdoors throw it at him, but since we already know he died partly because of starvation, he couldn’t handle the outdoors. On the good side, he is very dependent and a nice guy. When he gets the job at Mcdonalds mainly everyone there said that he was a nice guy and a hard worker. He is very kind to all the people who bring him in and I think giving them his respect helps him in the long run. If i had to describe Chris I would probably use the words selfish and arrogant.

Creating my own zine I think will be difficult. I haven’t started a whole lot thinking about ideas to write it on, but I do want to do a comical zine. I feel like the best way to keep people’s attention when they are reading something would be to make them laugh and keep them interested. I might try and add something about sports in one of the passages in my zine. If I can fit sports into the zine it won’t be hard to find stories or pictures that can help me illustrate my story. Other than sports I will try and fit some sort of humor in my zine and get some jokes from a book or online to throw in there. Some of those long funny jokes that are like stories, but end up with some twist of a joke. I want to have a humorous zine, along with some pages in there about sports.

King of Kong Analysis

saltena — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 19:08:11 +0000

King of Kong really was a story of an underdog trying to defeat the evil man ruling the world. It seemed Billy Mitchell and Steve Wiebe were going to have a big show down at the end of the movie, but Billy pulled ever stopper to keep that from happening. You never really knew what to expect going from scene to scene. To finally read that the director, Seth Gordon, didn’t plan on Billy pulling all of these stoppers is truly amazing. The fact that Seth decided to make a moviwe out of something his co-director’s friend was getting into and turn it into a good movie is very skillful. In the interview, Seth reveals he planned on the story being what we expected, a story building up to a showdown between Billy and Steve. The fact that Billy kept backing out and putting twists in the story without the director planning is amazing. Watching the movie it’s just kind of like wow I can’t beleive he keeps backing out and they actually made a movie about this. You just keep waiting for the big show down and you never get it. To find out Seth Gordon wasn’t planning on any of this happening makes it a better story. It’s cool to think that at one point Seth was just a kid who loved playing video games too, and ended up being a film maker gives people a lot of hope. The fact that Seth compared Billy and Steve to Darth Vadar and Luke Skywalker is correct. Billy controls all of these people and make them try and “take Steve out” in a way of not letting him break his record. Brian Kuh was running around telling everyone to come watch Steve on the kill screen which had to bring so much more pressure on Steve to know that everyone was coming to watch him. When Billy finally came to Fun Spot and you think the big competition is finally here, Billy walks by Steve only to say, “You don’t want to spend too much time around some people.” Billy just gets your hopes up just to crush them again. It’s truly amazing how good these guys are at Donkey Kong. When you think about it, it doesn’t seem to hard to be able to beat a Donkey Kong game. The way these guys break it down and know every single thing about this game is very impressive. One line i found very incorrect from the movie though was when one of the guys said that playing this game and training for these games is just like a professional athelete training for a decathalon. I think that is not true because you can adapt and practice enough to become good at this game, where if I wanted to go out and win a track event I would have to pracitice running a lot more and longer than to beat a video game. I think this is a very good example of an underdog coming from no where to take out the evil man on top of the gaming industry. Steve Wiebe proved to many people that just because people are trying to come up with ways to “take you out” you can overcome that and take down the man at top the world.

Tattoos

saltena — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 18:56:06 +0000

I personally think that most tattoos are very unattractive, but every once in a while you see that one that catches your attention. I like crosses that have the cross with some inspirational words around it. I like some of the random animals that some people get on their bodies that have a meaning behind them. I’d say if I were to get any tattoos it would either be a cross probably on the upper half of my arm above my elbow by my bicep. I’d want their to be some words under it in some cool writing form, probably something along the lines of live laugh love. I know one of my friends that has a tattoo it that same general directions along the same lines as that one just with different words underneath it. I always thought that was kind of cool looking on his bicep. If I decided I didn’t like the way that one looked I would try and find a way that an animal relates to my name or my last name and get whatever animal t hat is. If no animal does such relating to my name I’d try and get the one that fits my personality the best. If i just had to take a guess off the top of my head I’d say that a lion or a tiger some sort of animal like that. I would probably just end up getting the head of the animal and just having them blow it up. If I would like both the tattoos or one of them and did decide to look at more possible options I feel I would maybe like one with just designs. If I see just like some curvy lines with some sort of design made into it I might want to see how that would look maybe on the upper half of my back. There’s always that chance you could get that unheard of tattoo. The tattoo Steve-O has on his back of himself giving the two thumbs up is pretty hilarious. I might just be feeling crazy and want to get a picture of me with my two thumbs up who knows. There’s a chance I could want to get a tattoo of my zodiac sign Virgo. I’m not sure what the design for a Virgo would look like or if I would even like it but that’s always a possibility. If I were to get a tattoo it would definitely have a picture on it. I wouldn’t want something with just words on my body I would at least want some cool picture to go along with it. It would be pretty cool to get a tattoo of one of my favorite sports teams. I guess that would just be the definition of being a die hard fan. I wouldn’t want to get a tattoo where it’s very noticable or you could see it no matter what I was wearing. I would want it covered up so I would only show select people.

Quoting, Paraphrasing, and Summarizing

saltena — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 19:05:39 +0000

Quotation: Regarding low attendance for schools, Roger Sipher believes, ” One reason for the crisis is that present mandatory-attendance laws force many to attend school who have no wish to be there” (Page 1).

Paraphrase: Roger Sipher says if you get rid of the compulsory-attendance laws the teachers will be able to teach the students who actually come to learn and earn their grade.

Summary: Roger Sipher believes the compulsory-attendance laws are decreasing the chance of students to learn in a good environment. All parents want their children to have a high school diploma, but whether they have earned or even want the diploma is the question. If the students know they can graduate by doing nothing, why should they waste their time doing homework?

Subcultures

saltena — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 19:14:19 +0000

Starting off I didn’t think i was in many subcultures, but when you find exactly what a subculture is you realize your in a lot more than you think. Here at Purdue the only subculture I am in would be the intramural basketball team. The league starts in a couple weeks. I am playing with some my brother and some of his friends that who are all juniors here at Purdue. Another subculture of mine would be my religion. This i was born into and didn’t really have a say in what I was or wasn’t. My family is catholic. There are parts of what catholics believe that I agree with and that I also disagree with. It’s hard because my entire family is all catholic so I never wanted to speak up and say that I don’t agree with everything that is being taught. When reading off the list of the subcultures given to us I came across roller coaster enthusiast. I guess I could fall into that group. I used to be so scared of heights when i was a little kid. I couldn’t even go up on the roof with my dad when he had to fix shingles or anything on a ladder i had to hold on to the railing. As I grew older though, I started getting more and more comfortable with heights. I love roller coasters and I love going down huge hills. My brother and I usually try to get a couple of people each summer to take the road trip out to Cedar Point in Ohio so we can experience the great thrill of roller coasters. Another subculture I am a part of would be the hip hop. Obviously I’m no rapper or anything like that, but I really enjoy listening to hip hop music. When I am studying and I want to listen to a type of music just to keep me calm and just make sure I don’t get off subject it is always hip hop. I like to listen to more of the rap part of hip hop, but I have no problem listening to just hip hop from time to time. I’ve never been much of a dancer and don’t really know how to dance, but when hip hop is playing usually at a party or wherever it’s not a sin to go make a fool of yourself and have a good time. Gambling I think is viewed as terrible in societies but I don’t think that its bad to gamble every once in a while. In high school a couple of buddies and I would get together on a weekly basis and play a game of cards. The gambling I think is most addictive goes along with sports. Whenever a sports game comes on and two people don’t agree on it usually means there is going to be a beat placed. Whenever I argue with some of my friends about sports the only way to decide who is right and make the game more exciting is to bet. It can be dangerous to get out of control and bet for a large amount of money, but just here and there or even not about money maybe just about who cleans the room can still make a game more exciting. There is many things that can be classified as gambling, but not all are bad.

Hello world!

saltena — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 18:36:45 +0000

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