Lydia's Story

1. I think Jan Brideau's main point in Lydia's Story is to help paint a picture in peoples minds about the tragic times during Hurricane Katrina. The things that some people had to go through to survive the rushing water and how they lost their homes and everything in them. The author of this story indicated all of this in the last paragraph when she says "The enormity of the double hurricanes became clear only after witnessing so many people left without homes."

2. I think that the point of view in Lydia's Story is third-person. While reading this it gave me a bit of anxiety for "Lydia". I didn't know what was going to happen. The way that this was written made it seem like I was there, watching what was going on. It was like a cameras point of view and I was actually there with her watching what was happening.

3. In the second paragraph of the story it had so many descriptive words that it helped put you in the place where the story was being told, it prepared you for what was to come next.
Some words that Brideau used to help make the story come alive are: soft-spoken, waxed and waned, tender, extracted, devastated, raged, windowless, rushing, bulky, precarious, spurted, waded, dragging, crouched, recede, perch, budge, proud, essence, hope, determination. All of these words are great describing words that help put better images in a persons mind. They make your emotions stronger instead of saying "her tooth needed to be taken out" the author wrote "It appeared that the tooth should be extracted"

4. The tone is very serious and informative. The audience is the rest of the people in the United States who have been hearing about Hurricane Katrina just on the news. I think the author wanted to spread someones experience through the hurricanes to show people how serious this situation is. In my opinion I feel like Lydia's experience is one of the better ones, there are others who have died or others who have watched family members drown. Having that be said, I feel like sharing Lydia's story is to show that one of the lesser devastating stories is still pretty traumatic. The author could have just written from the third-person objective point of view and we wouldn't get to feel what Lydia felt when she thought she was going to down. Or how she thought she was going to drown but she got herself to think clearly.

Chapter 2

List of writing:
1. In class blog post for English 101
2. Taking psychology class notes
3. Texting friends
4. Emailing my boss
5. Thank you letter for my grandma


2. Taking notes in psychology class helps me better understand the material. Taking notes in this class is really laid back. It is more focused on short blips of what we talk about in class, rather than the entire module we covered. The notes are more intended for my viewing only, since I know how I learn best I can jot words, sentences or paragraphs in a way that I can easily understand. Someone other than myself might be able to read these notes and understand them, but it won't necessarily trigger an entire learning of a module into their minds. I don't have to write the notes but like I mentioned before, it helps me learn better and its also easy review. Having them written down on paper helps me focus on just writing the notes down, rather then writing them on a laptop, I could easily be distracted by having the possibility to go on the internet, play games, etc...

4. While emailing my boss I made sure I had a formal tone. This email was just about my work schedule and him asking me if I would be willing to come in a day earlier than planned. I could come in a day earlier so we had no conflicts there. My job is easy going but I always make sure to be a responsible person when communicating to my boss. He emailed me two days ahead of when I was planned to go into work and so I ended up going into the studio (where I work) the day after his first email was sent. I would have much rather had a phone call or a text from him just because my email is a bit of a hassle sometimes.

5. I sent a Thank You letter to my Grandma Sam the other day. She just got back from a cruise and got me a shirt! So I simply just wanted to send her a Thank You letter through the mail rather than a phone call, it's more meaningful. Since she is my grandmother I didn't have to be so serious but my tone was appreciative and casual. I wanted my grandmother to know how grateful I am for her and that I appreciate everything she does for me, even if its a shirt off of a cruise ship. She is truly wonderful!

In-Class Lab Writers, Authors and Genres 9/29/2015

 

Jacob agrees that everyone is an author, Amy disagrees.

Noah incorporated in his blog post that musicians, theater, etc… are also authors.

Emily states that everyone has the potential to be a writer but not everyone can be an author.

 

Writers:                                                                                                Authors:

Anyone can be writer	But not everyone can be an author
Informal	Formal
Writers write for fun/hobby	Authors write for a living
Writers might be published	Authors are most always published
Expresses themselves	Writes literary work, i.e. novels.

 

Type of Writing:                                                                Why you enjoy/ despise it:                                                         

Timed essays	Having too much pressure makes me not do as well. (despise)
Persuasive	I’m good at persuading people about certain topics. (enjoy)
Informational	I don’t like having to be so formal and doing a lot of research (despise)
Autobiographical	I like writing about myself and things I have experienced. (enjoy)
Personal Response	This one differs on the topic. So I can I enjoy it and despise it.

 Party-Prep directions:

1.       Go to desk and get invitations out of drawer

2.       Write Party info on invitations, put in envelope

3.       Put invitations in the mail box, put up the flag

4.       Look at the list of house duties you need to do, do that list.

5.       Grab my shopping list from the counter, go to store and get those items: Pizza, cake, salad, streamers, balloons, party hats

6.       When you get home, help me decorate and clean the house: Put up streamers, blow up balloons, vacuum, mow lawn, clean bathroom and kitchen, set up food

Scenario: Ask someone to help get supplies for a party.

Genre: Limerick

There will be a celebration,

Please send out the invitations.

Don’t forget the cake,

Come help clean and decorate.

So this’ll exceed all expectation

Rap about party prep:

 

Hey dude,

I need you to buy the food, for this

Party that I’m throwing for

My dad he’s turning fifty-four

This really needs to, be the best party that anyone has ever seen

Help with the party invitations

The fresh decorations

I need you to clean the house and also iron my blouse

Thanks for doing these chores, they will be quite a bore but

With you my dad’s birthday party won’t be a snore.

 

Party-Prep list

Send out Invitations to friends and family members.

House duties: Sweep/mop floors, clean bathrooms, clean kitchen, wash dishes, vacuum living room, shake the rugs and mow the lawn.

Store trip: Chips, soda, pick up cake from Dairy Queen, pasta salad from deli, 3 large pizza’s from Dominos, party decorations, disco ball, and rent a helium tank.

Help me decorate the house: Hang up streamers, blow up balloons, hang up 54th birthday sign, hang up disco ball and make sure it works,

Is everyone an author?

As the book Everyone's An Author states, everyone in the 21st century is an author, simply because of social media, the internet and written speeches. I however disagree with that, in my opinion being an author is being someone who publishes pieces of writing that took awhile to write, they took time, they applied the knowledge that they have learned throughout schooling or life experiences. That author should have went to school to learn how to write such things, not just some high schooler posting a Facebook status about his or her day in a well written manner. I believe that every persons view on what an author really is changes depending on the setting in which they see a piece of writing.
I personally do like the idea of having the world at our fingertips because of the internet but that is for the people who have access to the internet. College students in Third World countries might not have the ability to have access to a computer with working internet. so they don't get privileges that most people in the rest of the world get.Therefore having them not know about things going globally right away. They still might have to do things the old way, which in my opinion is just fine. Not having the resources we do today might help humans not take what they have for granted so much.

Collaborative Writing on Writing 9/24

Emily likes to write personal pieces, poems and fictional short stories.

Jacob enjoys to write fictional stories and research papers.

Amy takes delight in writing papers that are in the first person as well as persuasive essays.

Noah revels in writing first person essays.

Tones and formality alter depending on the audience which whom we write to. For instance, if it was a political audience we would switch our tone to be more serious. Children books, we have to make the tone be more understandable with youth. It also relies on the genre of your story, for example, in horror stories you want your tone to be slightly aggressive/dark. In contrast, a romance novel has a tone that is more seductive. Your writing persona changes depends on many things, whether it being your audience, genre, time period.