Final Paper

I'm a little worried about my final paper. I know what my thesis is, and what I want to say, but I'm still having trouble finding a good solid source. I find information on Siena's website, and littler articles here and there, but I can't seem to find that one substantial source for my paper. the same goes for my two other research papers I am currently working on for my other classes. I'm getting really nervous, it's getting close to my deadlines and I'm still not fully satisfied with what I have. Hopefully I'll be able to find a way to make this all work.

Thanksgiving

Hopefully everyone had a great thanksgiving. While I was enjoying my mother’s food, amazingly I thought about Michael Pollan. I had a great meal that was pretty healthy in my opinion, but none of the ingredients were organic or locally grown. This demonstrates that he exaggerated in stressing the necessity of organic food. I do not think that the meal that I had would have tasted different if my mother would have used all organic products.

Final Paper

I am glad that I found an interesting article by the USA today newspaper discusses the Pell grants available for minorities. I was a little worried about this final paper because I could not find a topic until two days before the thanksgiving break. My paper would prove the lack of diversity at Siena, and how many minorities are not doing enough to get their education in a college like Siena. Now I am feeling good about my paper, and hopefully I am going to show my point on Thursday clearly and concise.

The end of the semester

I have started a countdown until me last final. I am happy that I am making it through without any problems so far. I am enjoying planning out the end of this semester very well. I am making plan for my own personal study area for where I will work on my test. I miss see that I need to stay focused and work hard with everything that I plan on doing. My biggest problem is that I have a lot of papers to write in so little time. I have 11 papers to write and they all have to be the best that I have written so far this year. I plan on working hard with my professors and tutors so that I finish up my first semester nice and easy. I will do my best at making this semester worth all the hard work and make it to my goal for my personal self. I know I can do this and I will continue to do my best. Good Luck to me and everyone else with finishing up this semester.

Home Visit

Thanksgiving was a great this year for me. This was the first year being away for home and had to come back for the first time in a long time. My mother woke my sisters and I up early to help cook the meal. It was nine in the morning and I had stayed up until three that morning. If I knew I had to get up that early I wouldn't have stayed up that late, so I just waited until she called me for the forth time then I got up. I helped make chesse cake and the rice. My favorite part of the dinner was when we sat down and watched "Fred Clause" with Vince Vaughin. I was very funny and I think Vince Vaughin is the funnest comedian alive. It was great to have that much family time because I needed it beingaway from home and all the stress from school. I was happy to be home but I'm also eenjoying school.

It's Sunday evening and I am just about to leave home and drive back to school. It was a good Thanksgiving, but I am ready to get back to Siena and finish up this semester. Today was my favorite day of break, my mom, brother, and I decorated the house for Christmas. The tradition has always been to put up all decorations the weekend after Thanksgiving, and I was so glad that we continued that tradition this year. For the last 15 years that we have lived in our current home, my dad did his best to compete with Clark W. Griswold of Christmas Vacation for the most exterior lights anyone had ever seen. This year, we were not able to put up the lights outside, but next weekend our neighbor, who was a good friend of my dad, is going to help me put up the lights. I'm really looking forward to that. Then comes Christmas! I really cannot wait. It's my favorite holiday and it is so soon.

I hope everyone is having a great Thanksgiving break, I am! I am using the time to work on my papers. I had a great Thanksgiving but ate way to much food. The weather today is much colder than yesterday. I wonder if it will snow? Well goodbye for now my brain is fried from researching and writing. Time for a little rest and relaxation!

Dear Prof. Liptak and class,
It is the night before Thanksgiving and I am in the computer lab off the library at Siena. I am working on my research paper for class and also on my fifteen page paper due the Wed. we get back from break in my Buddhism class.
The research for my papers is more challenging than I expected it would be. My advice to you as a class and also to myself is to start your papers as soon as possible because they are so time consuming. I am looking forward to having Thanksgiving dinner with my family. I hope you all have a great Thanksgiving and may God Bless you on this wonderful holiday. I am grateful this year for my family. I have a loving family and I am truly blessed by God.

How great it is to be home for Thanksgiving. Last night my mom's sister and her family flew in from Tennessee, their other siblings joined us, and we all went out for a "Pre-Thanksgiving" dinner. It was so nice to have some of the family together for no other reason than to be happy and to celebrate how blessed we all are. This year is different for my family, but the more time i spend with my mom and brother I realize that I still have an amazing base at home.

Tonight my family and I are going to a friends house for dinner. My good friend is home from Arizona, his brother from Virginia, and sister from Florida, along with their parents whom are long-time friends of mine. It will be great to get together and share some laughs. The next day is Thanksgiving, and we will be going to my grandparents. This is about food of course so I am looking forward very much to my grandmother's turkey that is never done in time, my aunt's stuffing that no one likes but me, my mom's scalloped corn that I look forward to all year, and countless other things.

I hope everyone has a great holiday, and we all can look past everything that may have gone against us this year, looking only at the wonderful things in life. We have a countless number of things to be thankful for. Have a Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.

I was disappointed to see only a few new posts, but those that are up are quite thoughtful and meaningful.  First, Jonathan's brief thoughts about the problems and issues that affect him in his community illustrate my desired results from assigning this type of research project.  I was reading an article in one of my writing journals, and an author referred to traditional academic essays as "alien artifacts" for today's students. I like it . . .


I think that as students we are led to believe that issues are always circulating "out there" and that they must be "huge" in order to research and write about them.  Also, the issues that personally affect us are often trivialized.  I believe that oftentimes those "out there" have a tremendous effect upon those "in here" - you cannot completely separate the public and the private realms.  Finally, small changes in values and behavior have to add up to larger, powerful ones.  Don't we have to believe in this?  What do you think? 

John's post and Elizabeth's follow up . . . well, both made me well up.  It's a difficult time of year for me anyway, as you know from my first freewriting that I shared with you that first week in September.  But I do find comfort spending time with my family and friends and deeply, deeply value these opportunities. 

I just made homemade applesauce with my kids.  I've never done this before and can't believe how incredibly easy it is.  For almost thirty minutes we worked together as a team with minimal controversy (outside of "It's my turn to use the apple peeler!") and no distracting technologies (outside of my laptop on which I pulled up the directions and recipe).  It sounds trite and corny, but I'm trying to achieve a simpler life.  Not simple.  Simpler.  It just has to be the small things . . . Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours!
     

I went online this morning to write about how much work I have to do and how stressed out I was, but after reading John's post I can't help but realize how trivial that sounds. Life is very fragile and it’s scary how often we all take it for granted. I don't know if this year is unique or I am finally growing up but this year I have noticed an uncommon amount of sickness and death around me, from close relatives to family friends and even professors. It seems as though I am surrounded. About two weeks ago a professor and close friend of mine was in a terrible car accident. I'm sure many of you received the email and some of you might have even had her. She was my first history professor, freshman year, and was the reason I decided to become a history major. I've taken her classes many times after that and we became friends. I keep hoping that things will get better and she will be ok, but I really don't know. As a student it is difficult to get information and I do not want to bother her family. I just can't believe it I met with her two days earlier and then she was in hospital. It is so scary how fast life can change. This accident makes me look at my own life. The number of times I have told my parents to stop worrying about me driving, or yelled in exasperation that I was an competent adult, nothing will happen to me. It can happen to me. She is a smart, young, successful woman and the reason we became close was because I could relate to her so much. We could all be her. I guess the moral of my story is that we all have to take every day for a blessing and be the people we want to be now, because we just don't know what the future holds for us.

The semester is getting close to ending and I have a lot of work to do. I am working hard to get a lot done so I can enjoy Thanksgiving dinner with my family. I am so looking forward to turkey and all the fixings. I feel like a private eye with all this research I have to do. The research is fun and challenging.

the month of november

What a long and stressful month it has been so far. Some days I really just want to stay in bed all day and sleep or watch television, but obviously, none of us can do that. My father passed away a few weeks ago after battling cancer for nine months. When he died I really didn't know how to react. I didn't know if i should tell everyone at school and just stay home for awhile, or maybe I should just suck it up and get back to work...I guess I kind of did a combination of both. I was back the week after and I believe that it was the right idea. I made all of my professors aware of what had happened, and all of them were very helpful and supportive of me. On weekends, and sometimes during the week, I've been going home to spend time with my mom and younger brother. I feel like we are all still searching for answers, but at least it is good to be together to talk through things. There are many lessons that I have learned from losing a parent, first being; make sure everyone who you are close to knows how much you truly love them. I went home on a Friday and my dad died the next day, I was so lucky to have Friday afternoon and evening to sit and tell my dad how great of a father he had been, and I wished that I had done it before. Another thing that I have learned, as cliche as it sounds, is that people will not be around forever, and we should never take for granted the things that we have. My father was a successful businessman in the prime of his career, with everything going for him...yet when he got sick, everything changed. He was out of work and could only sit at home and contemplate his own illness. Now, that all is over and we are forced to press on, I realize how great of a man he was and what a great life he had made for himself and his family. Sometimes I think that I should have realized this sooner, but I am thankful that at least I have now.

Haha I'm glad we have this blog...I needed to get some stuff off my chest somewhere

I am the stage hand in the play "Into the Woods". The stage hands responsibility are things like: I move the forest moss that you see on the stage, I put the bed on stage for the big, bad wolf in Little red riding hood to lay on. I assist the cast on what they need and make sure they have their props. In my opinion this play could pass for a professional play. If you have a chance to see it, please do so you will not be disappointed. The play is long, about two hours and forty five minutes but it is so worth it.

It's almost done

It was my first semester and it was the hardest. I have never had to experience anything like this in my life. This is the most work and the biggest adjustment. I have had a good experience and wouldn't chance it for the world. I happy that it's almost done so I can go back home and relax. It was a lot of work and really hard for me to keep up with all my work. My first semester is my a hard semester that comes with a lot of memories. I taught me how I want to be and that I don't want to slack off anymore. I need to stay focused on my study because that is what I am here for. I learned myself a lot more and what I need to do to be a better student.

Free Writings for essay 4

Writing the free writing exercises I noticed that there are many things the affect the community as a whole, and myself as an individual. I did not think about these problems until I started to write these exercises. I noticed that the young teenagers are bringing many problems in our town that were not common few years ago. It seems that as time progresses, the safety and comfort of my town is affected by the behavior of many naïve teenagers. I plan to write my essay on how young teenagers are forming gangs that are affecting the reputation and security of my town.

Essay #4 topic?

I admit I procrastinated my free write for the next assignment, but in my defense, it's only because I have had a hard time deciding if a topic is good enough to research. All I can think about for a topic is pressure and the effects it can have. Even in high school, we would always question if our teachers would make our various assignment due on the same date on purpose. The pressure it causes is so ridiculous, even the most organized student would become disoriented. It's this reasoning that leads to the subject matter for our next writing assignment. I just hope it is good enough

The weather is definitely getting colder. There is not much time left to the semester. I am the stage hand in the play "Into The Woods". The actors/actresses have so much talent, the play is going to be a huge success.

An excellent point, Jonathan.  Especially since you were having trouble finding something to write about!  See, it's not so hard.  Sounds like a viable research project - but more on this tomorrow.  BTW - check out slowfood.org.

Christian and Rachel are viewing my blog with me right now.  They both say "hello"!  They want me to set up their own blogs, but we're off to bed right now. 

Every time I visit this blog, nothing comes to my mind and I have a hard time trying to write something. So I thought about how Siena makes every freshmen read about Omnivores Dilemma (the most boring book I have ever read), but Siena does not follow Pollans message because all the food the in Saga comes from corn!! Since we have to read this book, Siena should place more organic food on its menu.

From Christian Pesano

Christian is my eight-year-old son.  He wants to add a post, too, so here it is:

Candy.  Candy is so, so, so good.  My favorite is Milky Way bars.  I like how they taste because they have chocolate and caramel.  I and my cousins and Jack traded candy after trick-or-treating.  I traded Reese's Peanut Butter Cups the most because I don't like them.  For Halloween, I was Derek Jeter.  The Yankees beat the Phillies 8 to 3 last night!  GO YANKEES!!!

From Rachel Pesano

Rachel is my six year old daughter.  Here is what she wants to say:

Yesterday we carved our Halloween jack o'lanterns, and we scooped out the pulp and seeds.  And then we let the seeds dry and then we cooked them.  We put salt on them, and they were delicious. 

The jack o'lanterns were small and fat.  Mine has a happy face.  The jack o'lantern was awesome!  I like to carve jack o'lanterns because they are fun.