Working on the group project

Clay, Luke, and I have been working on are project since 5:30. We have mostly been working on a video. I think it is very good and it should help us with our presentation. We have had a little trouble working the movie maker but luckily we figured it out. It has been interesting researching and learning things about are topic. I think we will be successful in presenting our topic.

Christmas

I don't know about anyone else but I am already sick of hearing about christmas music. I enjoy christmas but I think that some people take christmas to the extreme. Christmas is my favorite holiday partially because my birthday is the next day. I like christmas because it gives me the time to see all of my family but also, like everyone else I love getting gets.

Group Meeting

The last assignment has been going pretty well. My group has discussed exactly what we are going to do for are presentation. We have already made a pamphlet and we are currently working on a video. We are going to give information about the drug war and why drugs should be legalized. This is a very controversial issue so we have to have good reasoning and good facts.

Proposal

Topic: Legalizing Drugs, Ending the Drug War

We are going to give statistics about things dealing with the drug war.

We are developing a pamphlet that we will pass out to the class.

We also plan on making a video to give information about are topic.

We are going to show a you tube video that shows a personal experience from people affected by the drug war.

We are still deciding on whether we are going to make a website or not.

Derrick Robertson
Purpose- Raising Awareness to the affects of the drug war.
Audience- ages 16 to 30
Media- Commercial/video, Pamphlet

In class we worked on all of are ideas dealing with are topic. We decided to find ways to show awareness and solutons dealing with are topic. We just talked about ideas for the video. Mostly we just gathered all of are ideas together. We plan on meeting on Sunday to work on the project again.

Someone help me find a major

We are almost done with the first semester and I still have not declared a major. Someone who likes their major please help me. I like doing a lot of things but I want to make sure I will be able to make a career out of it. I have thought about majoring business, communications, teaching, and construction management. If you have any ideas on what I should major in let me know. I need to figure it out soon and I am started to get pissed.

A young boy dying in my home town

A boy named Cooper died in my home town yesterday. I knew him pretty well. I used to baby-sit him. Cooper was in 6th grade and was liked by everyone in his school. My mom told me that he died in his sleep. They are not sure exactly what happened. When his parents went in his room to wake him for school he did not wake up. He was blue and black and did not budge when they shook him. They think something happened internally but they are really not sure what happened yet.

This is why all of us should never take life for granted.

Quick Meals in The Dorm

Living in the dorms I have made many easy and quick meals. Here are some ideas.
1. Pizza Rolls with cheese and salsa
2. Salsa with cream cheese with chips
3. Betty Crocker Brownies- you can get it at wal mart all u have to do is add water
4. Chinese microwave dinners- Chicken or steak
5. Easy Mac
6. Roman Noodles-Chicken Flavored

Basketball Season

I am very excited for basketball season. I enjoy watching high school and college basketball. Before I came here my favorite college team was Indiana. Since I played in high school I am a big fan and I love the game. I will probably go to the Ball State games. I hope that we are better than the football team. It is going to be very convenient for me because I live right across the street.

Writing Center

I have been to the writing center 4 times and it is very helpful. The people there are very good with writing and they are very helpful when it comes to helping students. They do not tell you what to write, they just give you good ideas and help you understand the assignment better. I would request the writing center to anyone. Even if you very good at writing papers, they will still show you new things and help you out.

Halloween

I realized that Halloween is a season that is very fun for all ages. Being a college student is a lot of fun. Two nights ago I dressed up as Wendy of the restaurant Wendy's. I was wearing a red wig and a red dress. I think everyone laughed and it was a good time. Saturday is going to be very embarrassing for me. My room ate is dressing as a pimp and I am going to be his slut. I think I will have a good time and hopefully not get made fun of to bad.

A Guy That Dances Around Campus

I have been walking to class on several occasions and I have noticed this guy that dances. This guy dances his every step. I have seen him almost 7 times and every time I see him he is wearing a black jump suit with a black hat. I wanted to talk about this because I want to see how many people have seen him. I am sure I will get some comments about this. If you have not seen him I am sure you will before the end of the year.

Food at Ball State

Talking to my friends at other colleges has been very interesting. They talk to me about their roomates, parties, girls, classes and most of all food. I have a lot of friends that go to Indiana and Purdue. All of them have complained about how they are sick and tired of the same food. They only have certain food courts that are a short walking distance. When I tell them that I am able to walk a short distance to all of the food courts they say that I am lucky. As I thought about it I think that all of us are very lucky to have a variety of food courts within a short walking distance.

Article For Paper

Trajectories of smoking among freshmen college students with prior smoking history and risk for future smoking: data from the University Project Tobacco Etiology Research Network (UpTERN) study.

This article talks about college students and gives good information about cigarettes and how it is affecting their current lives and their future. This article talks about how young teenagers are smoking more and more each year. This article also talks about how college students start to have more freedom this is why students start to smoke or smoke more on a daily basis rather than trying to sneak it from their parents.

This article gives good information about cigarettes and how they affect young people.


Citation:

Addiction; Sep2008, Vol. 103 Issue 9, p1534-1543, 10p, 2 charts, 1 diagram, 2 graphs

Midterms

These last few weeks I think a lot of us has students have realized how difficult college can be. I have had 3 exams in 2 days and I am pretty sure I only got a B on one of them. In high school I did not have to take any midterms so I have to adjust to them, which sucks. Now I know I should probably start study a few days before rather than the night before. I am sure I am not the only that has had trouble on their midterms.

The Weather

This weather sucks really bad. My favorite seasons are spring and summer. I hate fall because of how chilly it gets. The only reason why I like the winter is because its basketball season. I hate when it is cold especially when it is snowing and raining.I hope it does not snow to bad this winter because it is going to suck when we have to walk to classes.

Peer Review Question that was most helpful to me

Is there too much abstraction? Too much "telling" the audience a moral or lesson? Or so much abstraction that its not clear what the song actually says? Point out where you would like more concrete examples from the song and less explanation.

This question helped me realize that I was telling more of a moral lesson rather than writing about what the song really means. When my paper was proofread I learned that I needed more concrete examples too. I did not have enough examples for my song. This is why this question helped me a lot.

The analysis paper

This paper is going to be a little difficult for me. I am going to have a little trouble getting four pages. I think I am going to the writing center so I think they will give me some ideas to make it a little longer. I do like this assignment because it is actually interesting to study a song that we like and relate it to a book like "A Long Way Gone". I hope everyone is not stressing out to bad about this paper.

The cold weather

The weather the past week has been a little chilly. I do not mind it during the afternoon, but the mornings are very cold. If the wind would not blow it would not be to bad. One benefit from this weather is the temperature in the dorms are perfect. My dorm is not to hot or to cold it is perfect. During the winter it is going to be very cold walking around on campus. I never really thought about it until now. Winter is my least favorite season. The only reason why I enjoy winter is because that means its basketball season.

Smoke Detectors

Living in the dorms has been fun. I have met a lot of people and I have learned a lot of things. Two days ago about 5 smoke detectors went off on my floor at 2 in the morning. Everyone woke up and took the batteries out of the them. We could not figure out why these kept going off. Finally we all received an email that said the smoke alarms keep going off because of the humidity in the building. Since I live in Laffollete I have no air conditioning so this is why all of these smoke detectors keeps going off.

Finding a song to analyz

Since I listen to a lot of music it is hard for me to choose one song. I was thinking about doing a rap song by eminem but I realized that would be a little much. I thought about doing a country song but I think it was to straight forward. I need to find something that has a lot of meaning but does not express all of it during the song. If anyone has any ideas please let me know.

Listening to OPP in English class.

When I was in high school I looked at college as being a fun time but also being very difficult. My classes have not been to bad and actually some days I have fun in them. I would never think that I would be listening to OPP in my college English class. I never thought I could relate that song to something educational.

Ishmael Beah

Ishmael Beah impressed me with everything he talked about. Just hearing about him was very impressive but actually seeing him in person and listening to him was something totally different. When Ishmael said, " When I came to America I was very confused on how to work different things. I did understand how the hot water just came out. I did not think that I should eat the salad because I thought I was just eating leafs." It amazes me that people still to this day still live the way he did. If they would come to America they would be confused just like Ishmael was. I learned many things listening to Ishmael and reading his book.

Stressing About The Memoir

It was Monday night at 2am when I finally finished the paper. I thought the final draft was due on Tuesday which is was just the rough draft. I think a few other people in my class thought the same thing. I now know to read the syllabus and to pay a little more attention in class. One good thing about this is that I do not have that much to correct with my paper.

Living In The Dorms

Living in the dorms has been an experience for me. I enjoy living in the resident halls for many reason but the main reason is because of how many people I meet. I enjoy making new friends and learning things about them. I also enjoy living in resident halls because I am all really close to the food. Since I live in LaFollette I am very close to the food. I have enjoyed college so far.

Memoir

I am going to write my memoir about bridge jumping. Where I live their is a lot of bridges because of the creeks that run into the Ohio River. Well ever since middle school me and a bunch of my friends would always jump of these bridges, some were 10 ft high some were 50ft high. I have probably jumped of this bridge around 20 times and nothing has happened. Well two days before I went to college a kid that was mentally challenged from my senior class got pushed off the bridge by his older brother. When he hit the water his feet got stuck in the mud and he died. So his older brother got charged with man slaughter. So I am going to write about this story and talk about how people learn from other peoples mistakes. I just hope and get it over 3 pages lol

Coming To College

Coming to college was very exciting. Some people I met were very nervous and scared about meeting new people and having to go to class. I was ready to meet new people and to start the college life. The first few days were awesome. We had no classes to worry about and no parents to worry about what we were doing. Then Monday came way to fast we actually had to get up and go to class. This is when all of us freshman realized that we are probably going to have actually open a book. Classes have not been to bad for me but I am sure some students are going crazy.

Things I enjoy to do

I like playing all kinds of different sports. During high school I played baseball, basketball, and football. Out of those three sports my favorite one is basketball. I also enjoy lifting weights and fishing. I hope to play some intramural sports and to meet new people.

About Me

My name is Derrick Robertson I went to Lawrenceburg High School in Indiana. I have an older sister that attends Indiana State University. I enjoy playing sports and fishing. So far I have had a lot of fun here at Ball State. Since classes has started it has been a little stressful for me. One of my favorite things I like about Ball State is the food. I enjoy walking to different places to eat different kinds of food.