To Whom it Concerns

It’s almost the end, dear readers. Senior Year is closing in on us, forcing us all to finally decide what we want for ourselves once and for all and begin taking the steps necessary for the next chapter of our lives to begin. So, I would like to take the time to personally write a little bit to my closest friends.

To Emily Galbraith:
I love you. You are beautiful even if you don’t believe it. Don’t ever let anyone try to convince you otherwise. Ever. I want you to know that we will always be friends, even if you move halfway across the world for college. I’ll always remember you for the light you brought to my life whenever I was upset or needed a hug. I am also formally requesting a relatively regular Skype date so that we can be sure that we still maintain the connection required for friendship to be possible.

To Abigal Mandris:
You are perhaps one of the quirkiest people that I know, and that’s definitely a good thing. You’re stunning, innovative, and contain within you a drive that will push you to exceed your expectations again and again (not that anyone else mentioned in this blog doesn’t have the same quality). Though we may part for post-secondary education, I will continue to look back on the days of ups and downs at Alden High School and hope for another crazy random happenstance meeting in the future.

To Samantha Schweitzer:
You are a rare beauty, and anyone would be lucky to find themselves within your presence. Your ability to make those around you laugh and enjoy themselves is a quality that is difficult to find in a world spinning so far out of our control, and I hope that you will continue to shine like the beacon of sunshine and happiness that you are.

To Sarah Herget:
I can’t even believe that it has been almost ten years since we first met, and I can honestly say that I am glad that we were seated right next to each other in Miss Russ’ fifth grade classroom (Miss Russ was our fifth grade teacher, right?).  Throughout the years I have watched you transform before my eyes from a shy, awkward preteen to an adult who is completely comfortable in her own skin (or at least who has the ability to fake it pretty well). I will certainly miss you while we are off chasing our dreams, but I have faith that we will continue to stay in touch far beyond the end of high school (also, DFTBA).

To Valerie Dudek:
You are probably one of the strongest people I know, which probably explains your catalytic nature. Throughout the last four years, I have seen myself develop into a person that I might eventually be proud of, and at least part of that is your doing. You have opened my eyes to many things whether I was ready to accept them or not, and the abstract ideas and principles that you have introduced to me have helped me to establish an idea of how adaptable I can be when I actually try to be. Thankfully you aren’t moving for college, so we should continue to get together and do hilariously random things. Just because we can.

To Ernesto Mercado:
Meeting you was bittersweet. Sweet for all the hilarious things that I’ve experienced in gym class and theatre-based happenings and bitter for the fact that I had only a year to find out what a wonderful person you are. I’ll miss the conversations about which Yu-Gi-Oh! strategies work best, and the mock Pokémon battles always left me laughing hysterically on the inside (mostly out of nervousness because I couldn’t remember moves that were actually used in the games). Singing with you is always fun, and I look forward to the next time that we can stand outside after a theatre performance and just sing as if no one else is listening. Stay classy!

To Deanna Kocher:
A person with more intelligence than you is not easy to find, nor do I think I will ever find one. I appreciate every. Single. Second. That you devote to helping me be less of an idiot, and I have enjoyed participating in in-depth conversation with you on everything from The Great Gatsby to why zeros are inferior to ones (a thought that I refuse to accept, though I can understand why you think ones are pretty cool). I will miss you (and your brain) in the next few years. Skype chats will be mandatory.

To Michael Green and Hannah Best:
I will miss the Covey deeply. It is up to you now to bring Alden glory on the academic front, and I can trust no two seniors-to-be with this task more than you. On a non-Scholastic Bowl note, I really will miss the both of you. You don’t need me to tell you how awesomely intelligent (or is it intelligently awesome…) you are, but I’m going to tell you anyway. You’re super smart; to the point that it scares me and gives me hope for the future. As in, we might be okay if there’s more than just you with the same level of intelligence. I’ll miss the wit, the sarcastic retorts, and the regular (over-)feeding of Ego Cats.

To Kristen McMurtree:
You are not how others define you. If you get nothing more out of this, I want you to remember that. You are an able, independent warrior, and every time I look at you I think to myself, “This is true strength”. You will always have a friend in me, and whenever you need someone to talk to I will always be there to listen and advise as necessary. We aren’t actually going to be too far apart since we’re both dorming at the same college, but still, I feel that it is essential for you to understand that even when you feel like you have no one, you have me. Always.

To Jenna Wallace:
Oh, bus buddy, we’ve had some pretty interesting conversations on the way to school these four years. You make me laugh, and I appreciate it so much. Nothing makes a day start out right like laughing with a good friend on the bus (or, for the other half of the time, venting about why people are stupid). I’ll miss the incredibly arbitrary conversation that we have and the things that we actually talk insightfully about. Nothing comes to mind as of right now, but you know what I’m talking about.

I want all of you to understand how blessed it makes me feel to have each of you in my life. I would not be the same person if I was left uninfluenced by any single one of you, and the thought of living my life as if I had never met any of you leaves a sour, bitter taste in my mouth. So here’s to our futures, no matter where they may lead us. Here’s to us.

A Dedication

I am in no conceivable way qualified to give advice to a person about their future, especially considering that my own future is entirely cloudy with a chance of good karma. I know that there are many people that are heading into the education field, and perhaps now more than ever we’re experiencing some difficulty with the education system. We acknowledge a need for reform and can’t afford it, need to hire teachers who are familiar with potentially new ways of dealing with school issues but can’t afford to hire additional staff. For those who are choosing their place in life as a teacher or other school official, I would recommend an attitude of steadfastness. The time will eventually come when your services will be needed, and your patience, determination, and ability to wait until you are needed most will be rewarded if it all plays out the right way. I can’t think of additional advice to give, mostly because I myself am not pursuing a career in this field and cannot think of what training to become a teacher or the process of being placed as a staff member entails.

I think we all have an idea of an “ideal teacher”. Most of us imagine a man or woman who is relatively nice, able to ebb and flow with the days that life gives them and capable of creating lessons that both inform and create some entertainment value. I don’t believe in the image of an “ideal teacher”. The word “ideal” implies that there is only one correct answer, which is hardly the case. Anything that can be described with “ideal” or “perfect” indicates a subjective matter that will be different depending on the person. For that reason, the mere idea of “the ideal teacher” is trivial and impossible.

Now, one might wonder the reasoning behind the sudden interest in teachers. Perhaps I know a friend who has a cousin whose uncle twice removed roomed with a guy who was interested in the education field, or maybe I lied to you before and am secretly thinking about changing my major from Pharmaceutical Science to Education. Both of these ideas are incorrect.  I recently had the pleasure of meeting a wonderful young woman who filled the role of Student Teacher in my A.P. Literature and Online Publishing courses. Though I only see her a few times a week, we shared a handful of conversations that made me smile. After all, intelligent conversation generally makes me feel a little more hopeful about the fate of humanity. Miss Chryzanowski, though I knew you for only a short period of time, you will be missed in the halls of Alden High School. Good luck with your future endeavors, and may you find happiness in the vast majority of what you do.

My Television Choices are Weirder Than My Music Taste...

                It’s an interesting yet almost clichéd question of all time: “How much television do you watch?” It’s the sort of question you expect from a doctor at a yearly check-up, right after asking about your dietary habits and right before the follow-up question about computer usage. And you, dear reader, are almost certainly not my doctor, so you don’t actually need this information unless you’re planning on randomly polling blogs of this subject to obtain statistical information (in which case I feel the need to remind you that this type of format probably isn’t the best for your search).

                So, back to television. I actually don’t watch all that much actual television aside from the local and global news programs each weeknight. I find that there’s a lot of just complete and utter nonsense on now, so my time is therefore better spent browsing the internet, where I have the ability to watch what I want at my own leisure without worrying about re-runs or time conflicts (except for those conflicts that exist between too much media viewing and too little To-Do-list-tackling). Up until a few months ago, I only watched the late-night anime that was shown on Cartoon Network, and even then it was a mere hour of time. Bleach was always played at 00:00, and then Naruto was immediately after that until 01:00. However, I somehow managed to miss one of the airings and never got back to watching it.

                Since I still have sixty some-odd words left and have come to the limits of my television watching as far as the actual television is concerned, I guess I’ll just write a bit more about alternative media viewing. I definitely watch a lot more television programs on the internet than on the actual TV. Among the series that I am enjoying/ have enjoyed are Hetalia, CSI: Miami, The Mentalist, Criminal Minds, Sherlock Holmes in the 22^nd Century (a cartoon from the nineties), Yu-Gi-Oh!, Soul Eater, and various other videos (which are actually more like five-minute sketches or vlogs that people post to YouTube).  It’s sometimes hard to think about what I “should” be watching, what others my age are currently watching, because I know that I’m definitely a little odd considering some of my choices. I mean, half of what I watch/plan to watch is cartoon-based and the other half is all crime drama. The two are just so drastically different that I wonder about what kind of message I might be giving to others… Except then I decide that I really don’t care all that much about what other people think about, especially when it threatens to come between me and things that make me feel like I’m actually being myself. Embrace the awkward combination of children’s television programs from the nineties, anime, and crime dramas!
                There are a total of four televisions in our house, though only two are regularly used and one isn't even plugged in (that one is SUPER old; it has one of the spinny dial channel changer things instead of a button or remote, which is really, really cool!). Television is a common form of escape. I think of it in terms of this: In the late 1920s and 1930s, when movies were relatively new and cheap, people used the media form to escape the complete horrible-ness of the Great Depression. Now, our economy isn't so bad, but it's still pretty awful. Movies aren't cheap anymore, either, so we use cable television as our form of cheap, poor-man's entertainment. Of course, there are scads and scads of negatives with this topic, like increased laziness and reliance on technology to be our little entertainment puppets, but as with anything else, positives and negatives must be assessed in order to determine whether a subject is a positive or negative part of our society (I refuse to take a stance on this topic, mostly because I have no desire of making a hypocrite of myself).

Writings of Passion

                Writing. For some it’s a chore performed in school alone, ordered to be done by harsh, relentless teachers who seem to fail to understand that you have more important things to do. After all, that social life isn’t going to create itself, is it? But for some of us, writing is more than just homework or tests. Writing is an escape from reality, delivering the promise of hope, understanding, tomorrow, and improvement of vocabulary, spelling, and grammar skills. This follows true for me, personally, in the writing done at school as well as pieces completed in my spare time. And as far as the articles for Online Publishing are concerned, I have a relatively simple process.

                It starts out with interest. No good article was ever published that didn’t have at least a little bit of the author’s heart inside, and usually it’s a bit easier to lend a part of yourself to something you’re passionate about. What the passion is doesn’t matter. News stories about professional sports teams winning their last game of the season can be made just as interesting to read and to write as articles narrating an escaped prisoner of war’s experiences. So my first suggestion is to think of something that you actually enjoy, whether it’s volleyball, Friends of the Planet club, Prom, or the latest discovery in cancer research. I would personally recommend thinking of an idea that can be written about more than once with relative ease. For example, you could easily follow a sport team’s progress through a season or write a seven-part series about the 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens. Writing about prom seven or eight times? Not so easy and not so entertaining after the first two articles. I myself have found success in alternating topics that I can write over and over again, choosing to write half of my articles about a particular awareness (ex: April is Stress Awareness Month). The other half of my articles consists of in-depth research about professions that students can earn after leaving high school. The most important thing to remember about any article topic: Make sure you can find enough information so that it’s both interesting to read and relatively informational as well.

                Unfortunately, writing a good article isn’t just about being enthusiastic about the subject material. You actually have to gather the information about it. If you’re writing an article about something that happens within the school, such as Donate Life Club’s blood drive or a sports team, the information you gather should already be okay to put into an article. However, when writing about other topics, such as Awareness months, it’s important to try to find reputable sources. False information in an article isn’t good for you, for the readers, or for your grade. Don’t be lazy. Do the research.

                After that, it’s all about putting the information into a format that reads well. Forming complete sentences that reads like actual English (as opposed to the slang-infested nonsense that today’s youth insist upon inserting into any and all written documents) is important, as are attempts to use an accepted form of spelling and grammar. All of this makes it a bit easier for your editor to complete his/her job. With these tips in mind, writing an article for The Bulldog – or any other newspaper – should be a piece of cake!

Parental Units

My father is a working man,
His job always on his mind,
Though not always boiling in scorching waves;
Sometimes he just lets it all sit on the back burner,
Though it still simmers
Hot enough to scorch,
Yet cool enough to only irritate the skin and the mind.

My father is stone,
Soft and unbreakable.
With a sweep of his right arm
Nightmares are banished from my mind;
Minor accomplishments are made into incredible feats that no other person on this earth could perform.
With the extent of his left arm
Wrongs are righted,
Opinions are made and argued, challenged and reinforced.
Never back down, not if it’s truly what you believe,
And if someone still insists on telling you that you’re wrong, who cares?
You have your belief, resilient and intact,
Just like the paternal stone.

My father is more than he seems,
A man of many functions.
Father, brother, son, and husband.
Father to me, my brother, my sister;
Brother to my uncles and aunt;
Son of my grandmother and grandfather (R.I.P. Richard Gabbey (19XX-2009);
Husband to my mother, without whom he and I could not even
Begin to operate normally.

My mother is a woman,
Complete with all the mysteries that being a woman includes.
One cup femininity,
Two pints maternity,
Three tablespoons loyal devotion,
Two cups warmth,
But my mother through and through.

My mother is me,
And I am her,
Just as Eve is of Adam.
All backbone,
Knowing the perfect moments to both share hers and remind me that I have my own.
A safe haven for my innermost thoughts, and emotions,
My best friend.

My mother is everything,
Always achieving more every day,
Continuing her duty as
Mother, sister, daughter, and wife always.
Mother to me and my siblings;
Sister to my aunts and uncles,
Daughter of my grandmother and grandfather,
Wife to my father, without whom she and I could not even
Begin to operate normally.

Word War III: English Vs Spanish

                 ¡Hola y bienvenidos a Guerra de Palabras III: Inglés contra Español! Hay muchas diferencias entre las lenguas de Inglés y Español. ¡Vamos a empezar (pero en Ingles; lo siento por todos que leer este en Español, pero no sé escribir en Español muy bien)!

                Translation: Hello and welcome to Word War III: English vs. Spanish! There are many differences between the languages of English and Spanish. Let’s begin (but in English; I’m sorry for all those who read this in Spanish, but I don’t know how to write in Spanish very well)!

                Depending on your knowledge of the Spanish language, the mini paragraph above may or may not mean much to you. For those that know how to read Spanish and translate it even a little to English, you can tell that there are definitely differences between the two already (beyond the spelling, which we won’t cover here just because differences in spelling should be relatively obvious).

                One of the first things you’ve probably noticed is the punctuation. In English, we only punctuate sentences at the end of the statement or question. In Spanish, though, sentences that are exclamations or questions are punctuated at both the beginning and at the end. Here are some examples:

                “¿Quién es?” (“Who is it?”), or

                “¡Yo te quiero!” (“I love you!”; literally “You I want!”)

            The differences in punctuation aren’t just applicable to words. In Spanish, numbers that are over 3 digits long are separated by a decimal point instead of a comma. For decimals, people of the Spanish language use a comma. These are shown in the examples below.

           

English Writing	Spanish Writing
10,000	10.000
0.0001	0,0001

                There’s also the matter of including accents on appropriate letters in appropriate situations. Some words, such as “matemáticas” (“mathematics”) always have accents on them, while some are more like “quien” (“who”) and only have an accent when placed in a certain spot in a sentence. All of the main question words in Spanish have question marks, but if they can be used outside of a sentence they do not require accents.*

Question Word	English Definition	Word Outside of Question Context
Cuándo	When	Cuando
Qué	What	Que
Dónde	Where	Donde
Cuál	Which	Cual
Quién	Who	Quien

*In the case of “Por qué” (“Why”), the words are combined and the accent on the “e” is removed when not being used as a sentence, forming “Porque” (“Because”).

                 Pronunciation in Spanish is also different from the pronunciation used in English. In English, many letters have different pronunciations, such as “c” which can sound soft as in “secession” or hard as in “cover”. In Spanish, each letter has only one way to be pronounced, so pretty much everything that is said can be written phonetically (though accents may make it difficult to do this all the time for a novice Spanish speaker).

                Now let’s talk about grammar (this is where it can get a little messy. If you have difficulty understanding this, feel free to look this information up on your own. I’m sure there are others who can word it in a way that makes sense to you). Unlike English, Spanish nouns are separated by gender and number. This can get a little tricky, especially because there are four ways just to say the word “the.” If a noun is feminine and singular, the correct term is “la”. If a noun is masculine and singular, use “el” (no accent). If a feminine noun is plural, “las” is the correct word, and if a noun is both masculine and plural, one should use “los”. The problem with multiple ways to say something is common when speaking Spanish (though it is not unique in having this problem considering that English is at least ten times wonkier than any romantic language ever could be), but most native Spanish speakers will understand each other based on context.

                Spanish, as you will soon learn, is all about “agreeing”. This refers to the action of making sure that adjectives match the subject based on gender and number. If a person were to say, “La mujer es bonita” (“The woman is pretty”), their form would be correct. Because the subject is singular, the word for “the” and the adjective must “agree”. The statement “El mujer es bonito” is incorrect based on these same conditions. In addition, if “The green house is big” was to be translated, it is important to remember that the adjective “green” would come after the subject “house” and would look something like this: “La casa verde es grande” (note: adjectives ending in “-e” do not need to be changed to agree with feminine nouns. All adjectives ending in “-o” must be changed to “-a” in order to form a correct sentence).

                Another thing that must be taken into consideration when speaking or writing Spanish are the verbs. In Spanish, verbs in the infinitive form end in either –ar, -er, or –ir (for example, “buscar”, “correr”, and “escribir”). These forms can only be used after another conjugated verb in a sentence. Conjugating verbs can be relatively tricky too, if only because of irregularities in all tenses of speech. In the present tense, there are three main verb charts to remember, provided for you in the charts below. English translations of are shown in parenthesis.

-AR VERBS

Subject	Verb Ending	Subject	Verb Ending
Yo (I)	-o	Nosotros/as (We)	-amos
Tú (You, informal)	-as	Vosotros/as (You all, informal)*	-aís
Ella (She) Ello (He) Usted (You, formal)	-a	Ellas (They, all female) Ellos (They, at least one boy in the group) Ustedes (You all, formal)	-an

*Pretty much used only in Spain

-ER VERBS

Subject	Verb Ending	Subject	Verb Ending
Yo (I)	-o	Nosotros/as (We)	-emos
Tú (you, informal)	-es	Vosotros/as (You all, informal)*	-eís
Ella (She) Ello (He) Usted (You, formal)	-e	Ellas (They, all female) Ellos (They, at least one boy in the group) Ustedes (You all, informal)	-en

*Pretty much used only in Spain

-IR VERBS

Subject	Verb Ending	Subject	Verb Ending
Yo (I)	-o	Nosotros/as (We)	-imos
Tú (You, informal)	-es	Vosotros/as (You all, informal)*	-ímos
Ella (She) Ello (He) Usted (You, formal)	-e	Ellas (They, all female) Ellos (They, at least one boy in the group) Ustedes (You all, formal)	-en

*Used pretty much only in Spain

                Spanish is a pretty complex language, like most other common languages, but it’s a language that thousands of people in this world speak. As with other languages, differences exist between Spanish spoken in Puerto Rico and Spanish spoken in Venezuela. It’s an interesting concept, and while this guide doesn’t take every single difference between English and Spanish into account, it’s definitely a good place to start. ¡Adiós! (Translation: Goodbye!)