Last movie I saw...

Today was pretty sweet. I liked how simple it really was to add all the little features to make the map look like a map. I think it looks pretty good except the preset colors are way too similar. Oh well. It's okay.

The last movie I saw in the theater was the Dark Knight. I thought it was pretty cool, but the story line was a little intense. There were about seven climaxes and just as many places they could have ended the movie, and then it just kept going. It's a movie that you really can't watch a ton of times because it takes just way too much energy to watch. It was good though. The end was weird. I wasn't as impressed with it as I was expecting.

Tough stuff this week...

Today was pretty cool. I like GPSs. I have a Garmin and it's cool stuff. I got pretty much everything with what we did. No real problems except for the gps not working.



Well, I've got tons of stuff for this week. I have a lot for this class as well as a project for my history of creativity class. None of it is really difficult, it's just all really time consuming stuff I have to do. I'm just having to focus and use all my time the best I possibly can.

favorite internet site...

Today actually went really well. I understood how to make the labels and colors and stuff like that. It was really cool. No problems today, except I don't know if there are specific colors that we need to apply to each unit, etc.

I'm not really sure if I have a favorite internet site. I don't really have any site that I visit on a regular basis other than gmail and the byu home page. So I guess that's it. Actually the church website is really awesome. That might be it. Coolness.

Thanksgiving

I really enjoyed today's lecture. I had a hard time at the beginning but once we got going I was fine. I enjoyed flying through my 3d image. It was pretty awesome.

I am going to eat alot and watch movies for thanksgiving. My bro and his wife and my sis and her husband are all coming to my parents' house and we're gonna have a sweet time. I'm pretty freakin' excited. It should be really awesome. I hope I don't have to waste all my time doing homework. Peace.

Christmas music?

So I did pretty well today. I was behind on all the stuff coming in but with help from Miriam I was able to catch up and do all the stuff Adam was helping us with. It turned out really well considering my behindness and the beginning.

I'm not really sure what my policy is on when you can listen to Christmas music. My room mate has been listening to Christmas music for a couple weeks now, and I was on my mission for the last two years so I don't really mind that we're listening to tons of Christmas music. Oh well. I guess I'll know what my policy is in the next few years. I can't really define it. Merry Christmas and Thanksgiving.

Good Book...

Today was kindof frustrating just because the ArcMap kept closing. It did it about two or three times without saving anything I did. And then when I went to scan my image I couldn't. It wouldn't pick up the image on the scanner. I think it was because I drew it on the wrong side. It was frustrating. But I did understand alot of the stuff that we did. I liked how it overlays and stretches the mylar image. It was cool.

Probably the best book I've read in a while was the Book of Mormon. I know that's not very creative, but it's true. It's a way good book. And it's pretty much the only book I've read in a long time. Well, tchau.

Favorite place to eat...

Well, today I understood pretty well all the stuff. I was able to understand the different functions of arcgis pretty and stuff. I didn't have any real problems.

My favorite place to eat? Well... I would have to say Tucanos because it's so good. I love it and it's good Brazilian food. I like it so much. Too bad it's so expensive. Oh well. I'll go there for my birthday or something.

Jokes...

I was okay in class. I think there's a lot of stuff I need to review for the exam, and this class really helped me to understand that. That was my epipheny for the day. I guess my questions are all the things I need to review for the exam.

My joke is the only one I can think of right now. It's a laffy taffy joke: What do you call a nun who sleep walks? A Roamin' Catholic!

I understood pretty well how to do all the stuff today. I liked the words Nicole used. They were pretty sweet. I had to figure out a couple things that weren't well explained, but I got it pretty well. No problems.

Critique of Adam's presentation: Asked if we knew what it was. Really loud and annoying sounds. Just read slides. Stupid sounds. Loud backgrounds. I can't hear him over his sound effects. Didn't practice and so didn't know what was next. Can't read the yellow text. Too many words on the last slide.

Favorite Class...

Today I learned a bunch of stuff about poster making and I felt pretty good about it. I feel a little more comfortable with the assignment for the poster. I pretty much understood everything that we went over in class. No big problems yet.

I think that one of my favorite classes that I have taken was our Geology 210 class. It was so much fun. I enjoyed all the stuff we did climbing all over the mountains and making maps and things like that. And all the friends were so awesome. I had a good time with that stuff.

Places I have lived...

Today was alright. I understood almost everything that we did. I understood well how to do the colored gradient and stuff. It was pretty neat. I didn't really understand all the different uses for these tools, but it was good anyways. I hope to be able to use the tools we learned to be able to complete my assignments for friday. I didn't quite get all the applications for this stuff. I'll have to figure them out on my own as I do my assignments, I guess.

I haven't lived anywhere cool if you don't count my mission. I lived in Provo and Orem. But on my mission I lived in the Amazon Jungle. It was pretty awesome. One city I lived in was Itacoatiara. It was right on the bank of the Amazon River. I liked living there. It was a small peaceful city, for the most part. And it was really close to the deep jungle. I heard alot of sweet stories because of that. Tchau.

My weekend.

Today was pretty sweet. I feel a little more comfortable with how to apply the tools in illustrator to complete my assignments and stuff. It seems alot more applicable now than it did before. I understood pretty well how to use the tools to build a cross section. I wasn't quite perfect with all the tools and would like to know how to make it look great like it does in text books and stuff, but that will probably come with practice and stuff. It will come with time I think.

I had an enjoyable weekend. I went to my parents' house on saturday and watched football pretty much all day long. I really enjoyed listening to the BYU game on the radio. It was pretty intense. Probably the craziest game though I only saw the first half of. It was the Texas vs. Texas Tech game. Texas, the number one team in the nation, was dethroned. They lost by a touchdown with one second left on the clock. What an incredible weekend for college football. There were a few crazy games. It was great. I also watched Charade with my little brother. It was a good weekend.

Halloween tonight...

I did good in illustrator today. It was fun and I liked to learn how to divide and ungroup and all that fun stuff. I didn't have any problems with it and had tons of fun. I just didn't quite get how to apply all those tools we learned to make a picture, etc. I'll get it though. I think a review of what we learned would be helpful.

I am going to my parents' house tonight to hang out and maybe watch Charade or something, then I'm going to Amanda's party. It is gonna be awesome. Hopefully I will eat a whole bunch of candy. I think it would be cool if I didn't get sick when I ate tons of candy. That would make it even better.

Favorite

Today was pretty cool. I enjoyed learning how to make individual jpgs and stuff like that. I think this could be a really useful tool. I understood everything pretty well, though I got lost a couple times in a couple details of the more complicated things. I figured them out though.

I think that my favorite costume when I was a little kid was either a vampire or a cowboy. I think it would have to be cowboy. I would dress up like that even when it wasn't halloween though. It's the coolest though.

what I'd like to know about the future...

Today was good in illustator. I had never used it before. It seems like it could be pretty complicated to make something really useful in it and I hope I will learn to use it well. I think that I wanted to see something a little more technical be taught today because it seems like those things we learned were really basic and could have been covered alot quicker to save time. It's okay though.

I would like to know if the United States will remain a world power until the end of the world as we know it. I think that if I knew that I would be able to prepare myself a little better now for the future. It would really be nice to know when major national and world events occur.

Superstitions

This is my merged photo assignment. I feel kinda bad because I had this done yesterday and I forgot to post it until right now. I merged three photos and replaced the sky. It was really fun.

I enjoyed the merge tool today in class. I understood really well. I had no problems. Nothing went wrong, I guess.

I don't have a superstition, but I will make one up anyways:

I am afraid of vampires. I have to hang a crucifix on my bedroom door. I'm mormon, and that's really why this is a weird superstition. It was especially interesting on my mission. It was so hard to explain to explain to my Brazilian companions. I've had this superstition since I read Dracula. Whenever someone dies, we have to cut his head off and stuff his neck with garlic and drive a stake through his heart. That's my superstition.

Sports fan

This is the scanned photo I edited using photoshop. I adjusted the levels of lighting, I used the burn tool on the mountains and other background, and I cropped the photograph to remove scanned white area around the photo.

I understood pretty well how to merge photos I think. I think it's an awesome skill to have to be able to make panoramic photos, etc. I understood pretty well everything. No big problems were encountered.

I am a sports fan, but not as intense as alot of people. I absolutely love watching college football. I don't have a favorite team to watch. I just love watching a great game of football. I don't like the pros as much though. They don't seem to play with nearly as much emotion as in college ball. And I'm not as into basketball and all the other sports as I am into football. I just hope I can get tickets to the football game this saturday. That would be awesome.

favorite fall activity

Today was pretty cool. I liked learning how to use the burn and dodge tools today. It was really interesting and fun. I think the hardest part was using the gaussian blur tool and still keeping all the original details of the image. I figured it out pretty well though.

My favorite fall activity I think is going to the mountains to see the colors and stuff. I went on Saturday with my sister and brother-in-law but I think we were a little too late for that part of the mountains. We went to Cascade Springs and had a picnic. It was really fun. I just love the outdoors in this time of year. It is so beautiful and peaceful. A little earlier in the season would have been a little more colorful though, despite all the orange we saw hunters wearing. It was good times. Goodbye.

Best Date... so far

This is a mission picture of me and the Amazon River. I used the ruler tool to fix crookedness. The horizon was really crooked. I also corrected overall lighting. I cropped this photo as well.

I understood pretty well all the things in photoshop. I was a little slow in keeping up on the steps with all the details and stuff. I enjoyed it though. I didn't understand all the merging layers and stuff. It's okay though. I like photoshop.

I can't say which was my best date. It's all relative. And I think I have to leave and I don't have the patience to think up a good date story. Hopefully my best date will be in the near future. It would be very nice. I've been on great dates, but I need another.

Worst Injury

I understood well everything today. I really enjoy using photoshop. I echo Nicole's "photoshop's cool!" I was just a little confused when she was going really fast but my friend helped me out.

I never got injured really bad. Knock on wood. Um, I guess once I almost broke my back when we were playing capture the flag in the dark. I was running towards the flag, which was a glow stick, and I tripped on the parking tie and fell catching my chin on the picnic table bench and bent my back the wrong way real far. It hurt like crazy. But no permanent damage. That's lucky.

Above is my image from monday. I used the move tool to overlay the image, the crop tool, and the transform tool to re-size the blueberries. It was fun.

Favorite Season

Today was really good. I like learning about how to use photoshop and stuff like that. I had virtually no problems with the photoshop and stuff. I'm sure it will be a little worse as we go more complicated in the program. I already did my mini-assignment for next time. It was way easy.

My favorite season is probably fall because of football, the temperature, and the autumn colors. I love football so much. I also like that it isn't too hot in the fall and not too cold. Usually. It's been pretty cold lately, but that is a little out of the ordinary for this time of season. But I guess that is ordinary for Utah's seasons. The leaves changing colors is so awesome too. I think that one of the biggest reasons that I love autumn so much now is because I just got off my mission to the Amazon Jungle and my three-year summer is now coming to an end and I am just overjoyed. That's probably why I'm biased to this season.

Pets

I enjoyed the review today. I'm not so worried about the test so that's really good. I've had so many stressful tests lately and I was kind of worried about this one, but I'm not so nervous now. I didn't remember so well the first details we learned and stuff like that, but I'll review and go over the stuff and I'll do well. I promise.

I never had any significant pets like wolves or badgers or anything. The only pets I really had were fish. We had a killer tropical fish that ate its wife and children. We later found out that it was actually a convict. That's actually the type of fish. I know why it got that name. Then, after all that happened, I was at scout camp one week and my parents released the fish into the wild. They said they didn't have the heart to flush it when it was so alive, so they decided to risk the fish population of the mighty Provo River. For all I know he could still be out there terrorizing carp and bass. Who knows? Of course he is a tropical fish, so I don't know if we can be prosecuted for such an act. Don't tell the authorities though.

Adventure

I understood pretty well how to make charts. It was a good thing for me to learn. Every time we work in here I learn cool stuff though it seems like I'm learning alot of things twice in a couple of my classes. It is going really well because of this though. I didn't quite understand all of the graphs and charts' uses but I did pretty well.

I think I would like to go on an ultimate jungle safari of the amazon jungle. I served my mission there but didn't see all that crazy stuff end of things like I would like to. The amazon is sweet and there's alot of stuff I would like to do there. It could be incredible if money wasn't an issue.

Favorite Breakfast Food

1. the greatest difference on the table is 8592.8.
2. I understood all the formulas and stuff really well. I didn't have any problems with the lecture. I'm just not exactly sure what I'll do with my own table for the assignment this week.
3. My favorite breakfast food is probably biscuits and gravy. It is so good. We made it on Saturday before general conference. That's number one I think, but I also like lots of other stuff like omelets and waffles and stuff like that. I absolutely love breakfast.

Musical Instrument

I understood what was going on in class today. It was good stuff. I am in an information systems class right now so I'm learning how to do all this stuff in that class. I think it's really interesting to be able to do all that stuff. My problem was that I couldn't see the Nicole's screen well enough to imitate the details and stuff. But I feel comfortable with it all.

I play the trombone. Actually I'm not good anymore because I went on my mission and lost it. I know scales and notes and everything, but my embouchure is shot because of lack of practice. I'm also teaching myself the guitar. I'm not good yet, but I'm working on it. I love playing music. I play the piano a little bit, too. Not much though. I just enjoy it all and wish I was better, but I don't have the time to excell like I would like to.

Weirdest Relative

Today I really understood the uses of Adobe Acrobat pretty well. I was really happy about that. I was able to look ahead of Nicole and figure things out on my own as well. I didn't understand the functions of all the buttons of the toolbars that Nicole showed us though. She kind of went fast at the end of the lecture.

I think my weirdest relative is my uncle Eddie. He's not my uncle anymore, but that's really the safest way for me to write this blog without offending anyone that may chance upon this blog. He did so many weird things and he was just a crazy dude. He was an insane driver and didn't do anything worthwhile that I know of in his life. I guess that's not weird, just worthless. That's okay though. It's unfortunate that he is like that.

Worst movie ever...

Today was very enlightening. I liked learning about how to edit papers using MS Word 2007. I like the system. I enjoyed learning also how to review your own paper and the facility with which acceptance can be made on on revisions and editings. There were a few details that I didn't quite get because I was trying to follow along on my computer and I couldn't find the buttons as fast as Nicole, but it's okay. I'll ask if I have problems/questions.

Probably the worst movie I've ever seen is a movie called Napoleon. I actually walked out of the movie, which is the only time I've done that, I think. I didn't walk out because it was dirty, either. Just because it was stupid. I saw it when I was eleven, I think. It's about a stupid dog that runs around and has stupid "adventures." It is a little kid movie, but if any kid likes that, they should be exiled to an island far away from any form of civilization. What a stupid movie.

I understood everything in the lecture today. No problems. I thought it was really interesting to see how an efficient paragraph is constructed. It will definitely help me in my proposition. Since I had serious problems in finding sources for my paper I used an abstract in a GSA publication to identify the constituents of the paragraph. It lies below:

A glacial origin for the Mineral Fork Tillite in the Big Cottonwood Canyon area of the Wasatch Range in Utah is reaffirmed. The formation consists of two members: a lower sequence of thick, massive diamictites, with minor lensoid beds of shale-siltstone, sandstone, and conglomerate, and an upper sequence of more abundant shale-siltstone and siltstone that displays prominent bedding. The lower member is interpreted to be a sedimentary pile of tills and outwash deposited by multiple advances of continental glaciers. A grooved, polished, and striated surface marks the basal contact with the Big Cottonwood Formation. The upper member is considered to be of glaciomarine origin, mainly sediments released from icebergs and/or a floating ice shelf, along with rock flour washed from marine-based glacier margins. One major continental to marine cycle of environmental change is indicated as a result of slow but steady subsidence along a continental margin. Evidence cited here strengthens the case for a major glacial event during late Precambrian (Eocambrian) time in western North America.
Taken from GSA Journals Online

What I wanted to be...

Today my moment was when I learned how to make links and start to actually build things on the page. My problem though was I don't understand how I should organize my pages and stuff. I saw the page with all the required things but I don't know what kind of page I should use to build that.

When I was little I wanted to be a police officer. I don't know why. I guess that's every little boy's dream. But that really didn't last very long. It changed alot when I was little but that's the earliest one that I remember. Cops are the coolest when you're little. I guess they still are. Especially highway patrol-men. They get to wear the coolest hats.

My favorite food.

I understood pretty well everything today. It was a pretty basic review of things I already knew so it went very well for me today.

I really love sweet and sour chicken. My mother makes it really well. I ask for that every birthday. It makes me happy. It is something that I love to eat and I would eat it every day if I could. I think I will make it tonight if I have time. It is soooooo delicious. I have nothing else to say... there is nothing else to say. Have a nice day.

Superpowers!

So this blog is probably dated for the wrong date, because, like Nicole, I do stuff late at night and I was working all day and didn't get a chance to do this in class. But I thought that it was really helpful to go over the organization of our papers. That really helped me alot in my work. I wasn't really confused at anything, though. Which is a good thing I guess, or it means that I just didn't get any of it at all.

I would have to say that if I could have any superpower, it would be either extreme strength or the ability to fly. Flying has always been the focus of my super power dreams. Though I think it would be absolutely amazing to be as strong as Superman. I could do anything. And if that was my only super power, I could play all sorts of sports and be the star at all of them. Well, football would definitely be at the top of the list. Super strength would be awesome.

Is "Leathermen" the plural of "Leatherman"?

I was thinking for a while of all the tools that exist in this world and I decided that there is no single tool that I would be. So I decided that I would be my favorite tool in the world: a leatherman. The leatherman is the most useful tool there is. There's everything on it... It's the best. I lost my leatherman on the 210 trip, but then when I got home I found it. So I'm happy again. I guess it's kind of sad when my happiness depends upon a piece of stainless steel. But it's not just any piece of stainless... it's a leatherman.

Dream Vacation!

One thing I enjoyed about today's lecture was how to do research online. There are many resources that I didn't know about. I think it will be very useful to me, not only in my research for this class, but the BYU library has so much information that I really didn't know how to access. I didn't follow all of the complicated advanced search explanation that was given, though. That was a little confusing to me.

My dream vacation would be to the Swiss Alps. Those mountains amaze me so much and I would like to go there and see the incredible mountains and enjoy the beauty of the mountains. I think it would be so interesting to see all of that. It would be a dream.

Interview Preparation and Differentiation

Today I learned alot about the importance of preparing for an interview. I had never thought of studying the company beforehand or coming up with questions to ask the interviewer. I recently was interviewed for a job at a credit union and I did hear that question, "do you have any questions?" I didn't know what to say. I learned a few things about interviewing and I thought I was pretty well prepared, but I never thought or heard to ask questions. That's definitely something that will help me in the future. I did get the job, by the way.

I heard that we have to have an interest in the field that we are interviewing for and I'm not sure how to decide what I'm really interested in. That's my question. I don't know how to discover what my interests are. That sounds like something really important in the interview that I need to determine.

I can't think of anything distinguishing about myself. I need to get more involved in mentoring anfd research to be able to find such things. I think that as I do so I will be able to find some distinction between me and other candidates/students.

The Best Prank Ever

Today I really started to understand the Microsoft Word 2007 system. I was able to add shapes and format them the way I wanted to be able to design my own CV. It was rather gratifying. The problem I have is that I don't really know what to put on my CV. I've don't have much experience worth mentioning in geology, so I don't know exactly what to put on the CV.

The best prank ever was on my mission in Manaus, Brasil. I was financial secretary in the mission office for ten months of my mission. Every once in a while an Elder would have to stay at the office recovering from an injury or something like that. A certain Elder, whom we shall call Elder Ambrosio for the purpose of this blog, had sprained his ankle and had to stay with us for several months during his recovery. He was the kind of person that had to know everything that was going on. He would sit in front of us and just stare asking pointless questions. Needless to say, he drove us all crazy and we couldn't ever get away from him since he could never stay alone and his leg was in a cast and couldn't walk. So we decided to pull a prank on the poor child. The time was nearing for his transfer to a real area and to get back to work, but the mission president hadn't yet informed him to where he was being transferred. So, we took it into our own hands and decided for him, though this wasn't going to be a normal transfer. We utilized our incredible clerical skills as secretaries of the mission and prepared all the forged paper work for his transfer to the Belem mission. We took a plane ticket from the files and scanned it into the computer, switching names, dates, and city names and planted the papers on the president's desk. In front of the victim, a staged phone call from "the president" was placed and the executive secretary retrieved the phony tickets from the President's desk. All the papers were done and Elder Ambrosio believed that he was actually being transferred to the other mission. The prank was perfectly executed and if we hadn't blatantly told him of his folly he would have called a taxi to go to the airport an hour later with all his belongings. This was definitely the best prank I have ever performed.

Battle wounds...sorta

I learned alot of really useful things in office '07. It really was great for me to know this stuff on layout details and things like that. I had a hard time at first following to the tabs control window but then I figured it out and feel a little more comfortable with the new system.

Now, my scar story. I was playing ball with my neighbor many years ago when the ball fell into his wild bush on the side of the yard. It was an evergreen bush that had been trimmed recently. I stepped onto one of the branches in the top of the bush to retrieve the buried ball. Unfortunately, I didn't know that this particular branch was only partially present. My foot slipped off and the clipped branch ripped a long gouge up the side of my calf. A wicked scar formed up the side of my leg, that, quite frankly, I was very proud of. But, unfortunately the scar faded and is no longer visible today.

Factors of Style on CNN

I heard today that a man did a study at a university to see if typeface (font) plays a role in how a paper is graded. He found that using Georgia actually betters your grade by a third of a grade. So I guess it's a habit I need to create, starting with this blog. It's also slightly larger than times new roman, as you can tell, so writing with this typeface I can type less and you can think that I'm typing more. That means less work for me and more time I can use looking at rocks.

I looked on the CNN website to see what kinds of style factors were used and I found a few different things. The first thing I noticed was that it was written in sans serif. It is a web page, so as we discussed, they use that so the words look clearer and less blurred together. Its a good tactic in a news website where a lot of info is given written very small. Another thing they used was the bold type. This emphasizes important ideas and also links the reader to similar subjects in other articles. Also it is used for titles and headings to articles. I also notice the length of the lines. The site is designed to keep the attention of the reader. Especially the first half of the article is easier to read due to shorter lines. It is easier to hold the reader with lines that don't span the width of the site. It's also interesting that CNN employs straight quotation marks instead of "curly" ones. This gives me the sense of professionality. It definitely affects the voice of the article.

I think its interesting to see how an atmosphere can be set just by the way the type appears on the page. I'll certainly notice that a lot more in the future. Thanks alot Nicole. You bring out simple pleasures in my life. Now I can't look at mountains or even type without thinking analytically. Life is getting more interesting everyday. Right.

I love OneStop...NOT

Before coming to Geo230 lab today I went to onestop in the wilk. OneStop was designed to be a convenient, one-time-do-everything, kind of place. What it is in reality is a headache. No matter what needs you have, all of them are in the same room. In theory, that is good. But in reality, it just condenses the entire population of BYU into a very small area with high risks of rioting and uncontrolled human stampedes. I've had to go to this "ultra-convenient" location not once, but twice, and I must go back at least once more. I don't know if my blood pressure will endure another visit to that place. I would much rather sitting in the Geology lab in my 230 lab. Well, I guess I would rather be anywhere but at OneStop. It just makes me love the ESC even more.