A Time Of Reflection

For this post I'm told to reflect upon my midterm grades as a whole. Overall, I'm not pleased at all where I am. I feel like I came into college with the highest of expectations but the classes I ended up taking didn't motivate me at all to succeed. This is not where I wanted to be but I'm usually a second half type of player. Meaning that usually in the first half of a semester I'm not meeting the par that I have set, but more often than not in the second half I bring it back. I put my mindset back into "game-time" mode. I think I haven't done as well as I expected is because I was immediately overwhelmed by the fact that absolutely EVERYTHING is on you. From the start your expected to get maybe 2 semesters worth of work crammed all into 3 months. That's a lot for me to handle considering at my high school I was helped out a lot along the way and teachers were a big help to me. But in college its the complete opposite, I'm beginning to realize that but when I first my brain wasn't ready for the college atmosphere and expectations. But to change that I've got to start to stay on top of my work for the rest of the semester to get to where I want to be by the end of this semester. But as for goals that I can stick to to keep me on my game for the rest of the semester I can:

1. Start to dedicate more time to studying.
2. Start writing down my h.w. in my planner again.

I feel like if I can stick to those 2 things for the rest of this fall semester I can get to where I want to be by the end of the semester.

-Captain Dj

-College Superhero

Something Outside The "Comfort Zone"

So, coming from the "leadership" high school called Hyde, we spent a lot of time living our high school life outside of our comfort zone. We were trained to do so from our first day of freshman year, so getting outside of my comfort zone isn't as difficult for me to do anymore. So this Friday I was out with a couple of friends and we decided we would go to the mall. What made this trip to the mall more fun was that we decided to live the day as different, more outgoing people. I was that day my outgoing alter ego "Shaun Black" (a New York native who moved to CT to go to college). Ultimately we decided to do this just because it would be another chance to act stupid with my friends and create some new memories, but the day turned out being pretty enjoyable. Some people were really open to meeting people and getting to meet and learn about different people, while others were really stuck up, or spooked by the idea of someone just saying "hi" or something else. But at the end of the day we admitted to all the people we met who we actually were but getting outside of my comfort zone that day was really fun. We met a lot more people than we would have normally met just because we were constantly introducing ourselves, smiling, and getting to know people. At the end of the day were were pretty please with the way the day went and amazed by all the new found friends we met.

-Captain Dj

College Superhero

Watch my video, give me comments. It would be highly appreciated. Thanks my fellow people of the world... I'm talking to you Mr. Lithuania. :)

Peer Mentor: Your Awesome!

I don't know if we all have the same peer mentor but our peer mentor is Lee, and she's the coolest, way better than your peer mentor. Sorry. But yeah, had to put that out there, Lee came into our Inquiry lives around the 3rd week of college life. At first, I was kinda "iffy" about her. Usually peer mentors are just a waste of time, but she turned out to be a really down to Earth girl. I knew she would be awesome when she "got real" with us the first day of class. I would have never expected her to have that sort of past but I respect her a TRILLION times more because of being able to just be like "Hey, that was me, thats what I used to do. Now I'm different. Don't judge." She got me really thinking about what "motivated" me the first day she came into class and pretty much made me feel like i was lacking, substance. It was a legit wake up call and made me think of things a lot different. And, I thank her for that. So! Things that really work for Lee when she's in the class is the fact that she's more experienced with the whole "college life" thing and she bring a very unique or pretty deep topic to class every Thursday. I think thats really cool, keeps me on my toes and makes me think. The Peer Mentor also adds a more down to earth aspect to the teacher. I mean, Jen is a really sweet teacher but she doesn't get to see the side of college and life that were pretty much seeing now. And to have Lee there, gives us another person to go to and ask questions that Jen may not be able to answer. So in the end having a peer  mentor is pretty sweet. The senior student aspect is nice to have in class. And I've learned to think deeper in class and search inside me for motivation, also to try not to judge people, because people go through tons of "stuff" and most of us have no idea. :)

Making that "Major" Decision

As you most likely know, it would be totally awesome to live out life as a superhero but thats not very likely. So, I'm in need of a "back-up plan" just incase the whole "superhero" idea doesn't work out. But I don't have an idea of what I would want to wake up and do for THE REST OF MY LIFE!!!! I mean, life is a pretty long time and college is basically the place where you will make your final decision on what you want to do for life, I repeat LIFE. I just haven't come up with anything that I think I would want to do forever and then willfully want to do it. But I do have a few ideas:

1. I always and probably always will LOVE video-games. Since childhood I was a gamer (back in the Gameboy and Gameboy Color days). And my #1 childhood fantasy was to become a "video-game designer". In other words, I wanted and still quite possibly do want to make video-games for the rest of my life. Its one of the only things I think I would wake up in the morning and want to do. I mean for me that would kind of be like a college basketball superstar finally going pro. Something I could see myself enjoying, but something thats EXTREMELY COMPETITIVE and not to mention the fact that hours and hours of math would have to be completed to even be though of as a video-game designer. But I feel like if I got to do anything with video-games; even a video-game tester or a programmer or critic it would be prestigious in my eyes.

2. As of late I always felt I would be a good writer. My English teacher from high school said that I could quite possibly make it in the "writing industry", and as I continued to think about it, writing for a magazine or even becoming an author and writing books would be really cool. I mean I never really found it a burden to have to write (unless it was like a 10 page essay or something) but when it comes to free writing and writing about things I enjoy I think my creativity and imagination could come up with some pretty interesting things. Also writing has a lot of different outlets. I could even write for a magazine  that writes about video-games which would give me the best of both worlds. So "writer" is definitely up there on my list.

3. I was thinking it would be nice if I were to become a teacher. I mean considering I got into a really good Education school. And I could teach elementary education like 3rd or 4th grade which would be really fun because kids are so creative and innocent at around that age. But if that didn't seem appealing enough, I could teach in college or as a professor and teach things like writing or something I enjoy.

So as you can see I have a lot of option but I haven't decided on what I think I would want to do.

-Captain DJ

-College Superhero

How to Make a Perfect Blog. (In my Opinion)

I think to make a good or even perfect blog is different for every person. But for me personally, the blog should first and foremost catch your attention, maybe with the content in the blog, the title, the pictures, etc. If the blog doesn't catch the readers attention early it only takes a couple seconds for the reader to realize how lame the blog is and what a waste of time it will be if they read it.

 Also, once you've got the attention of the reader your going to also need to have a interesting and detailed opinion on the subject of what your writing or have something interesting to say about your life in general. For instance if the blog is based upon the judging of different hip-hop and rock albums. If the blog were just to say "I give this song a 5 out of 10" but give ABSOLUTELY no insight to why that CD would receive the ranking it was given, the blog to me has no purpose. I feel like since it is a blog, there should be some sort of opinion and personal preference to each blog posted. And depending on whether or not people agree and love to read or disagree and just want to play the "devils advocate" your blog will still be generating some sort of hype if your opinion is displayed honestly and openly throughout the blogging posts. So another crucial factor that will determine a good blog from a horrible one is "opinion" especially if your opinion agrees with what a lot of people would think, or if your opinion gets under the skin of everyone else and they just want to prove you completely wrong.

 And lastly to have an awesome blog your going to have to be CONSISTENT. Consistency is crucial. If your not consistent with your blog posts your fan base (if you have one) won't be able to view and read your posts on a weekly, monthly, or daily, basis. Its like running a television show, but instead of telling your viewers when to tune in to watch your 30 minute show you have them fend for themselves and just try and figure out when the next show will air. It just doesn't work like that. So the 3 elements needed (in my opinion) to make great blogs are:

1. A unique and creative way to catch and keep your audiences ATTENTION!
2. Your very own OPINION.
3. Consistency, Consistency, CONSISTENCY!

(A couple other opinions):

http://www.streetdirectory.com/travel_guide/113674/blogging/how_to_make_the_perfect_blog_post.html

http://www.squidoo.com/blogging-tips-create-blog

-Captain DJ

-College Superhero