Response Paper #3 (REVISED) The Play of Life

Andrew Manning

Matt Thomas

Language Arts 11

September 23, 2007

The Play of Life REVISED

Values, oh Values, What art thou values? Ah yes, the play of life is formed by our personal values. Our values form the base of the acts, create the boundaries of each scene, and manage the reaction of every character. In this response paper, I will explore the power of values, and unravel the secrets to its purpose in life.

Let us first ask ourselves: What would life be like without values? Maybe it would be fun, carefree, and full of peace & harmony without values holding us back; or maybe full of war, conflict, and drama with no values to keep us in line. But what would happen if there were no values? Lets us use “the director of life” as a metaphor for “values”. The director of life makes sure everyone is doing what they supposed to be doing. The answer to that is nothing. Nothing would happen. Everyone would stop speaking up, stop taking control, and stop everything. Imagine a world where no one had anything to stand up for, nothing to speak against, and nothing to strive for? That is exactly how life would be without Mr. Values to keep everyone going on.

The next thing we must ask is, “What is the limit of the power of values?” The answer to that lies within our souls. And that answer is Free Will. While values do influence our free will, free will can step in front of our values and take control. It is like the actor in the play taking his roll a step further, past the bounds that the director set, to give an outstanding effect on the audience. For example, one time in my life, I got into a conflict. The guy I was conflicting wanted to fight, but my one of my values then was to be pacifistic. But I hated this guy, I really did. And I wanted to show him that I wasn’t afraid of him. So I punched him, ignoring my pacifistic value. There was a short fight, but no one won because both of our friends split us up. All was well in the end after we apologized. We even became friends after that. How is that for stepping out of the bounds of the director?

Now that we have looked at both ends of the spectrum, we now have a clue to what purpose values hold in the play of life. We now know that values keep everything in order, while still allowing us to ignore them, giving us the power to take hold of any situation for your favor. The purpose for the existence of values is to keep everything balanced and structured. Some of you may disagree due to the fact that some conflicting values have caused arguments and wars. But the conflict is what keeps the balance, and it is our free will that causes the wars. So, in this play of life, keep your values while respecting other’s values, and don’t be afraid to take a step out of your values and show your true self on stage.

Response Paper #3 The Play of Life (Warning: May contain uber metaphore)

Andrew Manning

Matt Thomas

Language Arts 11

September 23, 2007

 

The Play of Life

 

            Values, oh Values, What art thou values? Ah yes, the play of life is formed by our personal values. Our values form the base of the acts, create the boundaries of each scene, and manage the reaction of every character. In this response paper, I will explore the power of values, and unravel the secrets to its purpose in life.

            Let us first ask ourselves: What would life be like without values? Maybe it would be fun, carefree, and full of peace & harmony without values holding us back; or maybe full of war, conflict, and drama with no values to keep us in line. Lets us use “the director of life” as a metaphor for Values. The director of life makes sure everyone is doing what they supposed to be doing. If there was no director, what happens to everything? The answer to that is anything. Anything can happen. Everything would be completely random and scattered without Mr. Values to keep everything squeaky clean.

            The next thing we must ask is, “What is the limit of the power of values?” The answer to that lies within our souls. And the answer is Free Will. While values do influence our free will, free will can step in front of our values and take control. It is like the actor in the play taking his roll a step further, past the bounds that the director set, to give an outstanding effect on the audience. For example, one time in my life, I got into a conflict. The guy I was conflicting with wanted to fight, but my one of my values then was to be pacifistic. But I hated this guy, I really did. And I wanted to show him that I wasn’t afraid of him. So I punched him, ignoring my pacifistic value.

            Now that we have looked at both ends of the spectrum, we now have a clue to what purpose values hold in the play of life. We know now that values keep everything in order, while still allowing us to have momentary potential to any situation. The purpose for the existence of values is: To keep everything balanced and structured. Some of you may disagree due to the fact that some conflicting values have caused arguments and wars. But the conflicting is what is keeping the balance, and it is our free will that cause the wars. So, in this play of life, keep your values while respecting other’s values, and don’t let your big ego attempt to control the stage.

Failing at research

I can not find Mark Eubank’s email address. After receiving my Second Response paper (after being one of the papers to be presented in front of class, again ), I read some of the marks that Matt left on the paper, one which said the following:

“I would like to see this paper with maybe some quote from Eubank responding to your ideas – you should email him!”

I am now in the moment of revising my response paper, and trying to find that weatherman’s email address (but with no avail). If anyone has a lead for me, pleas let me know.

Thank you/kthxbai

- Andrew Manning

P.S. – Kthxbai is one of the most annoying things to read. It is easy to read (at least for me), but it bugs the holy shit out of me when there is no cat in site. Thank icanhascheezburger for that.

Response Paper #2 Mark Eubank = Modern Puritan?

Andrew Manning

Matt Thomas

Language Arts 11

09/17/07

Mark Eubank = Puritan?

A lot of you may know about Mark Eubank, the famous weatherman featured on our local KSL news broadcast on NBC. Mr. Eubank is my favorite weather man and I always watched the weather. But it just dawned on me that this old man could be a modern day puritan, but weather forecast being his religion rather than Protestantism. But what in the earth makes him so Puritanatic?

Something that you may see puritans do a lot, is arranging large spectacular public speeches. These speeches usually tried to provoke people to believe what they believed in. John Edwards did this all the time. Well my friends, Mr. Eubank does the same thing, but he has larger crowds than John Edwards could have hoped to have in his time. Mark Eubank had his speeches in front of a chroma key on localized television. How‘s over 100,000 thousand viewers for a crowd? Not only that, he infects the minds of little children with his weather phenomenon with speeches in elementary schools all over Utah.

All you ever see Mark Eubank do is talk about weather. Even on the news, the anchors will ask for his remark on a story and he will change the subject to weather even when his segment isn’t next. It’s like he talks about weather like men talk about sports. But how does this connect to him being a puritan? Well, puritans are obedient, are they not? Wouldn’t some one so obedient to a subject act like that subject was their highlight of the day? Most puritans have this loyalty to their religion, but when compared to Mark’s loyalty to weather, we can say that “obedient” is an understatement. He actually made his house and yard into a weather station, a church so to speak. Mark’s loyalty to weather is so absurd, there is no possible way anyone can weigh over this man on the scale of Obedience.

You can see now that Mark is absolutely a modern day puritan. In fact, he is probably better than any modern day puritan. If there were such things as Supermodified Puritans, Mark Eubank would be one. But now, with all evidence provided, let us imagine Mark Eubank was the same man back in the beginning of the puritan years. But instead of studying weather, he practiced Puritanism. Do you think that he would be just like Jonathan Edwards, or spectacularly better?

Response Paper #1 – Andy Goldsworthy and His Creativity (and why)

Andrew Manning

Matt Thomas

Language, Arts 11

September 10, 2007

Andy Goldsworthy and his Creativity

Most of the students in Matt’s class saw the documentary on Andy Goldsworthy. They all may not quite understand him, but they all saw his creative genius. They might have been wondering: why is he doing this, what made him so obsessed, and is he on something? I don’t know why he does what he does, but he obviously is mentally different from many people. And that, my friend, could be the case. But still, we must dig deeper to find out how this man ticks.

The first hint we have at solving the puzzle of this man is one of his quotes, “I enjoy being by myself… [And] to be honest, I think I am drained by people.” That quote made me wonder if Andy Goldsworthy has Asperger’s Syndrome (a form of high functioning autism). Usually people with Asperger’s Syndrome have obsessions with things that would be considered “narrow” by regular people. That would explain his obsession with his funky art. But that still wouldn’t explain why he gets so creative.

If you were paying close attention to the documentary, you could see Andy Goldsworthy study his surroundings before he went to work. He was gathering every little detail about the area, getting ideas for what he was going to do next. Sometimes he would get inspiration for his work from the environment itself. For example, when Andy was building a dome out of those sticks by the river, he said that he got the idea from the whirl pool in the river.

Let’s look back at paragraph two, when I mentioned that quote that Andy Goldsworthy had made. Maybe since he is alone and away from everyone when he is doing his work, he has time to think up what creative thing to do next. I happen to say the same thing about being alone. It gives me space to think about a lot of things, without being bothered by the social drama wars in the outside world. I tend to be the most creative and imaginative in this alone state of mind. That could also be why Andy is able to be so creative with his work.

So all in all, why is Andy Goldsworthy doing this? We can never be so sure, but with the evidence explained we can make a pretty good educated guess. Lets look back at all that was written. Andy Goldsworthy is defiantly different from us, he is obsessed with his work, he is in key with his surroundings, and he is able to work well by himself. With this evidence in hand, we are allowed to guess that the reason why he is doing this *insert drum roll*… is because he lives off of it. He is so obsessed with his work it’s unlikely that he will exist if he stops. And the fact that he does his work alone, unless his helper is there, probably makes himself more welcome to do his creative art work. Even if that is not the case, Andy Goldsworthy is an excellent creative artist, and I will now forever be a fan of this wonderful man.

Oh boy, Sunday :(

Sunday is a dreaded day. It is the day before Monday, and it is the day when there is always a violent rush to get homework done. Like always, I don’t predict the right amount of time an assignment is going to take, and I don’t do enough on Saturday. Now I am stuck on last paragraph of the responce paper that is due tomorrow, and I can’t think of anything. I might be here all night, and I will sleep throughout first period.

Damn Sundays.

But Monday’s are worse.

- Andrew M

P.S. Has anyone noticed how I have been ending most of my post recently? There is a certain format to it. I end it with two lines, each have a little comment on it that relate to each other. Why do I always notice these things? It bothers me sometimes.

My likes that I dislike, and vis versa

This entry was taken from my main blog. You can check out my main blog at http://rathbot.wordpress.com, or you can get to it from the right hand side bar. K thx bai

No one will lie about this: everyone likes something that they really hate, and vis versa. Don’t deny it.

Recently, I am having a dilemma over a band that I like and dislike. It is about their newest song, Keep Me Away From Me, that they released. The reasons why I like it are: the strong voice and the potential the guitars have. The reasons I dislike it are: the format of the song that matches every nu-metal band’s songs, the fact that it sounds like a normal everyday mainstream rock song, and the lyrics. I have to listen to that song over and over again, but I want to fucking hate the fucking song.Its been bothering the fucking shitnits out of me. Its a pointless power struggle tug of war in my mind.

The only solution to this problem, is to like the song. My hateness for it apparently can’t win over the likeness for it. So I must end the power struggle and murder the hate.

So that ends one of the problems. But there are millions of these like/dislike problems in my head. But I can’t beat down the hate in every one of those problems. It is totally pointless to like everything isn’t it? But then I can’t kill the likeness either, because hating everything is stupid. Hell, there is a same type of power struggle in this damn paragraph. Its a god damn vicious, psychotic, demented circle.

When does it end?

Thats a dumb question, circles don’t end.

- Andrew M

Thats all folks.

My amazing mind

It is amazing how far I can go with my mind for a short period of time. I zone out alot during my classes (Yes Matt, even your class), and I think of the craziest scenarios. They are usually related to the subject being discussed in class. But the weird thing is, the scenarios go over the course of many years in my head while only a minute is passing by in real time. It amazes me to the extent that I want to research it, deeply. I wouldn’t be surprised if the subject of daydreams becomes another narrow interest of mine.

Thats it for this entry.

Andrew M.