Lit circle book 3 part ONE

Fortunately there is only about 5 weeks of school left, but that still leaves a month for doing work. The last book that my partners and i chose is Maximum Ride by James Patterson. It is an adventure book about these experiments that are 98% human and 2% bird. The 2% bird gives them wings, being able to fly, and raptor vision and each of them has their own abilities too. In the story so far, the six experiments are visited by erasers ( half human half wolves) that comes for a visit. In the attack, all six is severely hurt but one of the members of the family called Angel is captured. The family splits up with different plans, one trying to save and rescue Angel, the other to blow of nearby erasers.

These mutants are secretly hidden from society and this quote shows it well:

"Why dont we tell on them, then?" Nudge demanded. "We could to a TV station and tell everyone and say, Look, they grew wings on us and, we're just little kids,and-"
"Okay, that would fix them," Iggy interrupted. "But we'd end up in a zoo"

This was when Fang suggested that they tell society about the cruel and unjust things done upon them to turn them into mutants. If the people found out, a lot of people will feel sorry for them and how it is against the natural rights of humans. I am sure people will help fight against the School and bring it down. Unfortunately though, other people, maybe scientists, would say that wow theses species are so interesting, let me examine them. If the truth was leaked out, there is a pro and a con to this situation. Would they rather have freedom but have the chance of getting hunted down by the people in whitecoats from the School, or have justice served and be a special kind of people. There is always a chance that the people will respect their differences and still let the part bird humans live peacefully in the high mountains.

i think that letting society know about these experiments might be a good idea because Angel could be saved easier. But at the same time, they can kill Angel before the School gets searched. dun dun dun

yesterdays tennis adventures

Hm. i have nothing to write about so i will write about what i learned yesterday. I arrived at the tennis court after i took the bus home and biked to washington tennis court. I saw the regulars that go there nearly everyday, Ron and Erwin. Fortunately court 3 was open and we went there to practice. Erwin is wayy more experienced that me and ron so he was going to coach us for free. First we volleyed around and rallied a bit along the baseline, i was the one that usually hit the ball out.

The first thing that i learned that i was hitting the ball wrong, the position of the wrist. I was hitting it with my wrist and arm straight, but my wrist and arm should be at a 90 degree arc. This helps you become more consistent because when you hit the ball at a 90 degree arc, there is less chance that your racket will wobble out of it hard and firm. There is also a larger margin of error from your strike zone if you stroke the ball in this manner.

The second thing that i relearned was how to volley. I was never good at volley since the two years that i played. It was like footwork, they never listened to me when i wanted them to do a movement. I was instructed to tuck in my elbow and make the 90 degree arc with my wrist and arm again, and then punch! In my opinion, this form felt and bit rigid when i was trying to practice this volley. My wrist kept turning back straight and that annoyed me , not listening ...

The last thing that i was able to practice/ get advice on was the second serve. The idea of the second serve is to spin the ball in so that it gets in the diagonal service box. If the first serve, with speed and power, fails then you rely on your reliable second serve to spin. zzz. So second serve is a lot different than the first. You are supposed to stand parallel to the baseline, toss the ball so that it would land on your head, try to pronate and hit the ball at 6 - 12 oclock. haha , now to simplify these terms in more than one sentence. When you bend your knees, your non hitting arm is directly straight and telling you when to hit the ball. With the serving arm, you want to have your elbow pointing the sky for a full swing for full spin. One problem i had was that i hit the ball downward too much when i should had been adding spin. The result of hitting downward too much makes the ball land in the net. sooo when trying to spin the serve, just spin only ...

After practicing all these skills that i coached on, i went to hit with Ron. After this one attempt at a flat serve, my elbow suddenly hurt. i was scared of getting tennis elbow, so i left as soon as i could, after playing with Ron.

monthly review

In the adventurous book, Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins, it continues with the plot from the prequel The Hunger Games. Katniss, the main character, is forced again to go into an arena to fight for their lives. This time was a collection of past survivors, one male one female from each district, from all past 75 hunger games. Before Katniss went into the games, some districts were rebelling or on the brink of rebelling. Fortunately before the end of the games, an explosion was set up so that the tributes were rescued out of the donut shaped arena.

A character that interested me, was the female tribute from district 4. Her name was Mags, a close friend with Finnick. During the training sessions, it was clearly seen that she was a expert with tying knots and making baits for fish. She taught some of her skills that she acquired from her district to one of the star crossed lovers, Katniss Evergreen. After the training sessions Katniss already thought that this character and this other pair called nuts and volts were useful. Mags' plan for the interview was to take a nap, i guess she cant really show the judges how to make bait.

The one thing that stood out about this character is that she is the oldest of them all. Her age, around 80 years old, is a factor that slows the four people group of Katniss, Peeta, Finnick, and Mag at first. She cannot move very fast herself, in the jungle so she had to have Finnick get her a long piggy back ride. Mags helped the team experiment whether or not these gigantic nuts were safe to eat. Thrown across the force field and burned, it was safe, and a meal was prepared from that. Mags used her skills from her district again, when she and Finnick made grass woven baskets for food and water.

Mags quickly dies in the beginning of the games when there is a dangerous fog that drives the team away from their rest place. From the burns that Katniss got, they learned that the fog has the effect of burning the skin and can even kill when taken a full blast of it. Running as fast as they could, with Mags on finnicks back and Peeta on Katniss' back, Katniss tripped. Unfortunately Finnick had to take both Peeta and Mags, while Katniss barely escapes from the fast fog. A few moments later, Finnick announces that he cant carry both Peeta and Mags because the fog is hurting his body. Mags just voluntarily walks into the fog to die a painful death. This part of the book really confuses me on why she did that, she could have still tried. The only reason that i can think of is because Mags volunteered herself for this special games in place of a person that Finnick likes (Annie), with Mags knowing she wont win.

In my opinion, the purpose of this book was to continue with the storyline from The Hunger Games and add on to it. The last book ended with a section about the love between Peeta and Katniss, is it fake or real? I look at this part of the story as the author wanting to tell the audience how underground love can be. It is like a decision of , do you want to save the country for a guy you barely know or do you want to run away with your long time hunting buddy. The stranger, Peeta, saved your lives many times, like from the loaf of bread and once or twice in the games. Gale, also somewhat saved her life, by helping Katniss and her family have more meat. I could tell that this could be one of the purpose of writing this book because Katniss is indecisive about who to pick in the beginning. When president snow, came and threatened her that she needed to be loving with Peeta, she had even more pressure.

Another possible purpose for this book, is to expect the unexpected. When the rules for the 75th Hunger Games, the quarter quells, there was special rules. "On the seventy-fifth anniversary, as a reminder to the rebels that even the strongest among them cannot overcome the power of the Capitol..." (forgot the page that i got it from) This showed that even though Katniss, Peeta, and all the other victors won the games and was promised to not be in the drawing again, the impossible happened. Rules that are from ancient scripts can over run other rules that are less powerful. The ending of the book was also pretty unexpected because i did not expect everyone to be on Katniss and Peeta's side. The message came across to me that people can give their lives away for a cause worth fighting for.

In my opinion, the best tributes and the worst tributes all sided with katniss and peeta. It should have been a thing where not everyone agreed on supporting the starcrossed lovers. Another thing about this book that really gets on my serves is about peeta. For this sequel, i really hoped that peeta would die from an accident but noooo. When Peeta is shocked death, Finnick should not had came to the rescue with cpr, this should have been the sad moment where died. I know it is mean to wish someone dead but he did even less in this book than the first book. All he did was make a map of the arena with the clock hands.
if i were the author, i would try to make the ending even more epic and grabbing the audience even more. Even though the current one is good enough, i would add someone that is close to Katniss dying. This would make her go into panic because her hometown and home people / person is gone. Fighting for the revolution from there on will be that much more meaning full because it is to help revenge a dead person and to show that Capitol can not do everything they want. The idea of Peeta and Katniss revoluting against the government is old because it is from the first book, but they need to do it at full power for it to be useful. The people of Panem are all ready for a revolution, they just need a leader to help guide them and not be killed. If i were to write this book , i would make katniss less lucky, so that she doesnt get stuff she needs last minute. It can add an element of surprise into the book if something bad happens to her.

book two , lit circle 3

uhh, I returned my overdue book to the library last week, so my memory of what happened is quickly fading away. Katniss and the group of allies that she acquired figured out an important fact about the arena, it works like a clock. At certain times at certain parts of the arena, there is a natural disaster like a tsunami. When the group found this out, the Capitol did made a tornado happen, and the group was confused about where the hands of the clock were. I think that the Capitol should had just removed this element from the Games, if it was found out already. If the group found out once, they will have plenty of more opportunities to reveal the secret again. It would be better if the natural disasters were mysteriously random.

In order to try to kill the remaining tributes, Beetee , Katniss , Peeta, Johanna, and Finnick think of a plan. The plan was the tie a copper wire around a tree, extending the wire all the way to the beach. At midnight the lightning would strike. By doing this, if the remaining tributes were near the water, they would die if not the food in the water would die, and the tribute would die of hunger. Half way down, Katniss senses something suspicious when the wire is cut by someone/ something. She is immediately jumped by Johanna and Johanna cuts deeply into Katniss's arm.

Katniss is confused of what is happening, well i was too until i finished the book. Katniss walks back to the tree and sees that Beetee is unconscious. Just when the lightning strikes, Katniss aims an arrow straight at hole in the force field. BOOM! there is a big explosion, and katniss is rescued out by the people trying to start a revolution.

racket crack part 2 and serve dayy

Well in my last blog post about my tennis rackets cracking, i said my second expensive racket had a small crack. Now the crack has gotten bigger and bigger, almost surrounding the whole throat of the racket, but it is about one inch away. This part is not that much of my concerns anymore because that racket, i have given hope on.

It was one day during our carefree week of spring break, i hadnt done much, not even exercise much. The last friday, i hanged out with my friend and then took the 51A bus to the washington tennis courts. I thought," cool, my friends are at court 5 playing with serves, huh there is a kid at the kid... what is he doing ?" These friends are some of the best players out at these courts, it is like a privilege to play with them. Waiting til i was invited, i found out that Josh brought a radar gun to play with, measuring how fast our serves were. Josh told me that i could come in the play with them and i should take some serves. I thought uhh i am not ready at all, but i still went to take some serves.

whoosh! My first serve that went in was about 85 mph. This really surprised me because a few months ago, when someone else had a radar gun, they only measured 70 mph. I always thought that radar gun was lying to me. So i kept serving to see my max speed, it turns out i got 92 mph before they wanted to serve again. It was amazing how fast my serve was even though i wasnt fully warmed up, height advantage! Also interesting how i can serve that fast with a racket that has a broken throat. Unfortunately, when i was serving, i hit the kid that was measuring the serve with a 86 mph serve. Ouch, that must of hurt but he was alright with it.

I stayed on the court to see how fast the other serves were. The kid that was the son of Josh, unfortunately got hit again but this time it was much faster, 108mph. It hit his arm directly the size of a tennis ball and it looked like a terrifying bruise. The max speed was when John the captain of encinal high school came and crushed all the other speeds with a 112mph serve, his 115 almost got in. Well before he came, the fastest speed was 108 by Jason. I cant believe that John beat all the players that were about 4.0 - 4.5 in skills. The only way i think he got his serve so fast and strong is weight room. He does not really have a height advantage because i am around five inches taller than him. Jason said that he wanted to try using my racket, so i lent to him. The moment his racket contacted the ball, Puck!, the strings popped and that was the end of that racket. rest in peace.

book 2 , lit circle part 1 / 2

In the previous book , it ended when Katniss and Peeta got home to district 12 and Peeta feels that katniss's love is really fake. So continuing with the story line, president snow came to katniss's house to tell her that she must act very in love or there might be consequences. When i first read this, would threatening to kill her family and Gale really work at a threat, she rebelled against the Hunger Games. Peeta and Katniss's similar way of thinking were to show the Capitol that they werent just part of their games, like a toy. So Katniss gets into her role along with Peeta, they go to the extent that they would get married and have a wedding preparation. By this time, Gale and Katniss mutually know that Katniss and Peeta are fake. Katniss asked each Peeta and Gale if they wanted to run away in the forest to live forever. Peeta's response was that of course, but they had a whole family to bring along too. Gale's response was that he would go away with her, but there might be a rebellion in the mines and he wants Katniss to support her, resulting in Katniss not running away

Katniss's hopes of running away when there is a new leader of the capitol people in town, he adds electricity to the fences that guard the city. Gale is beaten by the new leader called Thread, in the public because he was caught with a turkey. I think that the other neighbors should had protected him before katniss / peeta came to the rescue. Katniss got hit my Threads whip so this helped Katniss as an excuse to not have to try wedding dresses as long. Before the fence was fixed, Katniss met

One point that surprises me is the 75th quarter quell, an anniversary games that celebrate how the people were tortured. Unfortunately the rules for this game was that all past victors were to be put in the the selection, leaving one boy one girl. Since katniss is the only female victor , she is forced to go to the games again, just on time to prevent a rebellion. Although katniss thinks this too, i wonder is this set up by the president to stop war. Or did the creators of the games really make up these rules 300 years ago with such good timing? I think it is a bit suspicious but they still have to go on with the games.

So before the games starts, there is young and old people unlike normal games were it is just under 18 years old. katniss and peeta were the youngest and there was a 80 year old lady that volunteered herself in place in a young girl named Annie. I somewhat expect the old people to die earlier because they arent as strong but the old lady allies with Finnick ( the guy tribute from their district), Katniss, and Peeta. All the tributes slowly becomes friends with katniss and peeta, they even held hand all together the day before the games. I think this would make it hard to kill each other freely, but the next day, Finnick speared the guy from district 5 just when the games started. It is somewhat weird how all the tributes collaborate so well. Peeta and his clever way of using his mouth, convinced the crowd of the Capitol that he and Katniss secretly are already married and that Katniss is pregnant. This made the crown feel really sorry for the star crossed lovers and they didnt want them to die anymore but they cant really do anything about it.

even though that they have to go try to survive again, i hope they win the games or that something unexpected happen...

writing goals

It is the start of a new quarter and that means we have to do another statement purpose for our blogs. I kinda forget but we might have not done one during the end of the first semester. I looked through my old blog posts from the school year, and i find stuff mostly about my hongkong trip but i also see writing about tennis, and a lot of school related assignments. What are my current goals as a writer? From the prompt that was posted up, it said we have about one last quarter to blog.

I plan to blog about anime, some more tennis stories, weird facts about me, and my goals for the future. The only anime that i talked about so far is Full Metal Alchemist, meaning that i have a lot more to write about including prince of tennis, naruto, bleach, ultimo, pokemon, yugioh, kirby, and one piece. Each of these animes have a special element in them but most of them have the idea of protecting your friends. My tennis stories will most likely about the ones that stand out to me the most because i cant remember my daily stories with clear details everyday.

Goals that i can write can be the ones in the near future or they can be in the distant future. Well for the goals that is near, i guess school counts because that is the main thing we need to suceed in right now. Recently, we were given the light yellow forms to fill out what classes we want. I turned the paper in yesterday afterschool, unsure about what to choose for zero period. It was either journalism or current life, i was unsure about journalism because i am not very cofident with my writing skills. The option of current life was not as good as journalism because it is only half a year, but i need that class to graduate. I decided to get zero period because i found out that we were allowed to have zero thru fifth period. This would make my future as a junior much more enjoyable because i get to get out of school at lunch on tuesdays and wednesdays. For the rest of my classes, i chose regular English 3, Ap Us history , Ap calculus, Ap Physics, and Hp Spanish 4. Yesss i know 3 Ap and 1 Hp classes will be hard and it might mean getting 4 hrs of sleep half of the school year, but Apush and Hp spanish 4 i might not get in. For Apush we had to fill out an application and it included a essay and a segment saying why you wanted to be in that class, i kinda bsed it because it didnt really really want to be in that class. For Hp spanish 4, we had to write a one page essay about either who is the person that is most important in your life or why you chose this class all in spanish. I hope with these advance placement classes, they can look good on my transcript and result in a good college. For longer term goals , i want to get better in tennis but not that much get into varsity. Getting into varsity in Ahs is quite pointless because we dont progress there.