For the love of chicken wings

If you know me you know I really really don't like chicken wings at all. They're nasty and hard to get the meat off of and they are usually covered in dark meat, which I cannot stand at all. I usually will bite into the bone, that's a really really gross feeling, or I will accidentally get a piece with a lot of gristle in it and won't be able to chew it at all because it's so disguisting.

There truly is a point for me bringing up the discussion on chicken wings. Last year when the Postville meat packing plant immigration raid happened, almost a third of their workers were busted for either not been a citizen, having a green card, visa, or working at the plant underage. People as young as 14 years old were working at the meat packing plant, while you can normally work at 14 years of age, the conditions at the factory were such that the age requirement of eighteen years old was required.

The factory at Postville was required to shut its doors for about too weeks time, when they pulled workers up form texas to help them get the company back under way. The poultry department was opened, though they have been moving with about half the force they had been before the raid, and for the time being the beef department/ area has been kept closed because of lack of workers.

I'm not here to debate the morality of the deportation of hundreds of these migrant workers, though they were doing jobs that no one else wanted, for lower wages. The got paid lower wages because the company didn't have to pay social security taxes on the wages of the workers. Many people will say that, that is a completely immoral thing to not pay taxes, but the workers who were there weren't actually eligible for social security or anything like that, so it wasn't really hurting anyone.

Different Types of Marching

I have found that over my career as a march that I have not been introduced to many forms of classical marching, our last years show was Carmina Burana, though it was not a real march, it was written in a classical style and that is as close as I have gotten to marching a classical march, so far.

Until about the 1600's marches were notated to percussion styles only. They were used in the military to keep order and keep everyones feet moving at the same beat so that no one would run into anyone else and every soldier would be accounted for according to a position that he was given in the line. So originally they were written as solely percussion pieces. They then adapted a tuneful instrument to go along with the percussion to add some color and keep the soldiers spirits higher as they marched, they adopted the trumpet. Music was expanded to give trumpets a part that lead away from the percussion and rang out along the troops.

In the nineteenth century many marches were written still for the same purpose but in a different way, a more creative way. The instrumental section of the marchers grew into an actual marching band and many famous composers created marching pieces, like Sousa, the developer of the Sousaphone, or marching tuba.

While traditional marching pieces were written at slightly faster than walking tempo, around 100 beats per minute, French marches were written at a rapid pace. They were written at the pace of 120 to 140 beats per minute. This way because during the Napoleonic War, Napolean wanted the rapid transport of troops throughout the country side and this was a quick conveniant way to keep it happening, also the French adapted the faster tempo as part of there march style from Napolean on out.

Many American marches written during the time period of 1845-1860 adopted the French style of marching, while the British style had a great influence on American marches, the French had an even greater impact. For the same reasons Napolean had, the American wanted there soldiers to be able to cross the vast territories they had, and in a fast manor. Also America had a great bond with the French as, France was strong allies with them for a long period of time. Also the fast march tempo originated in America during their war for independance when the French had sent over military support and the commanding officiers of the French took there marches at the stereotypical speed of the French.

Shin Splints =(

So the past three weeks I've started running every day. I started out with a simple two miles and have now made my way up to nearly five miles. But this increase in stress on my legs has started causing my legs severe pain. There of course are many explanations for this sudden pain, but the one most likely is that I have shin splints.
Shin Splints are stress related, and caused by the overuse, or excessive use of a muscle. It creates little tears between the bone and muscle and causes a lot of swelling in the area between, leading to pain. They can be caused by an increase in exercise or beginning to exercise that muscle. They are usually caused by running, jumping or other activities that involve the motion of pounding on the ground. The pounding on the ground motion leads to soreness and thus also leads to shin splints or can also lead to stress fracturing or ankle problems.
There is a harsher condition caused the same way as shin splints but happens because of an extend time period of doing the activities that cause shin splints, this condition is called chronic compartment syndrome, or CCS. This occurs when the indistensible anterior compartment of the leg becomes swollen with blood. The swelling is so great that it blocks the transport of blood to the areas around the muscle. This lack of blood then can lead to severe pain and other problems such as the necrosis or the muscles around the shin bones.
Some other causes of shin splints related to running is the fact that some runners over stride, or take to big of steps. This causes the runner to land very heavily on the heel every time there foot strikes the ground, thus this problem of shin splints is very very predominant in military boot camps where the stride is stretched an the march style causes a greater pressure on the heel of the marcher. The marcher first strikes the heel on the ground and pushes of with the ball of there other foot causing the weight to be mainly distributed onto the heel of the foot now landing on the ground. All of the force of the weight plus times the movement of the person and distribution of the weight is transfered through out the leg of the person doing the marching. During the marching time the foot rapidly hits the ground sometimes at the velocity of one hundred and sixty beats per minute, thus marching is an extreme cause of shin splints. Sometime people say that when you get shin splints they are caused by a weakness in the muscles of your legs that attach to the shin, in my case this is definately not the truth.
I am involved in various activities that involve a high risk factor for shin splints. First of all I am a marcher, I march all fall, and then have the problem of accidentally marching during school in the middle of the halls, just a little habit of all of the marchers at our school. Since I mentioned that marching is the number one cause of shin splints, this makes me a high risk factor for splints, but since I haven't had shin splints until this year that is probably not the cause of my shin splints. The second possible reason for my shin splints is the fact that I am in Tae Kwon Do, an activity that involves quite a bit of jumping and the popular cause of shin splints, landing too heavily on the heel of your foot. Since October I have been involved in a rigorous Tae Kwon Do program designed to get me ready for my testing in twenty-seven days. This program and workout schedule involves two hundred bunny hop jumps a day, where I touch my knees to my chest and then land on my feet again, this is a possible cause of my shin splints but all of the pain that I felt during the beginning of me starting out this workout is now gone. But it is still a killer workout for my abs and I have started to develop a six pack, my lifes dream, just kidding. So that probably isn't the problem that is causing my shin splints.
I am coming to believe that it is a combination of all three of these activities is causing enough stress on my legs to cause these shin splints.
There are a number of ways that you can help to relieve the pain of the shin splints but the only two ways to get rid of them are strengthening the muscles to be able to handle a high level of stress, or lots of ice and rest. But I have found temporary relief in double doses of asprin and a miracle massager called the stick, it's a long wooden stick that as a roll of bead attached to it. You roll it over your legs and it massages the muscles, it helps to relax my muscles after a long work out and make it so my legs don't feel like crap in the morning when I get up.
So I guess until my muscles get strong enough I am going to have to survive with relief of pain by asprin.

Going to the theaters to watch the previews!!!

I'm one of those people who absolutely love movie trailers, doesn't matter what kind, but I love them soo much. There's just something so exciting about about them, it intrigues me and draws me to actually want to go to them. Well that is the magic of advertising.

They all draw me in and make me wonder what the movie would actually be about, and then I usually forget about it during the movie. There's something mysterious about watching them because it makes us always guess, oh what's this movie about? Do I really want to go see this? Is this movie gonna be good or just completely dumb? I always fall in love with the good movies like three seconds after I start watching the trailers and only the good ones are really vivid in my memory.

Watching the trailers is also quite humorous, we get to make fun of all the dumb movies and say stuff like, "Wow are they getting desperate, making a retarded movie like that." And if we end up going to one of the movies that was amazing in the previews and turns out to be really really crappy we will boo in the theater until kicked out or chastised by one of the workers. No matter how bad the movie I have never gotten up and left a movie. I always just sit there and suffer.

Oh and then if you're on a date with someone you really really don't like and your watching the previews for the movie that looks like it's gonna be a piece of shit, then the person you're with is like, wow that looks like an amazing movie we should go see it. Then you have to be like, oh ya sure, it's a date and your thinking oh crap don't try and plan it now. Then they end up asking you when you want to go and you my friend are officially stuck on another very very crappy date. Btw I'm speaking from personal experience.

It's always a bummer when you get to the theaters really late, they usually have like five minutes of time before the previews and that's okay to miss, but if I miss the previews I'm gonna be really quite distressed, because to tell you the truth that's my favorite part of the whole movie watching experience, I could care less about the actual movie.

Procrastination Due to Snow Days

I've decided that the recent snow days have actually fueled my procrastination habits rather than given me extra time to do my homework/ projects. I think I have all of this time to do everything in, so I start to hold off on doing it and maybe stop working on everything after getting about five minutes into it. On tuesday night when it started snowing, I stopped doing my homework, a move that was quite risky since it wasn't finalized yet, and started playing video games.
Then when Wednesday rolled around I did nothing all day and waited til the night to start my homework, when I learned that school was called off, I stopped doing my homework and started playing video games again.
Thursday is the same story over again only worse because I slept in until like 11:30 that morning, and then Friday school was called off and I totally thought screw this I'm not doing and homework til the weekend. So then I went and made plans for Thursday night, all day Friday, and made it a point not to return home until very late Saturday morning.
Of course I have plans to go raise hell on Saturday with my friends, I betrayed Kennedy by going to a Wash swim meet and rooting for them because a really good friend I have goes there.
So for the last four day I did absolutely nothing productive and now I'm left with today to get all my homework done that was due wednesday and all of the longterm stuff that was due last week. And that includes my three blog posts, that I am working on today =).
So in that regard it really helps all of us procrastinate, but also what is the point of doing any work this week, because we all now we have to relax because we are going to be playing catch up next week.
Which then puts added stress on all of us because we now are quite rushed to do all the thing we missed the past week plus all of the new stuff we have to do, life doesn't freeze just because we have a snow day. And for those of us who had big projects that are due the following week, we are doubley screwed because if we needed help, oops it's too late now.

Hurray For Snow Days?!?

First of all I would like to say that if I were a senior, I would have much different views on all of the snow days we have had recently.
You would think that every high school student would be happy about the lack of school due to winter related problems, I for one am not. We've missed five days of school so far, and we are going to make them up, that fact is quite sour for me. I am one of those people who absolutely hates winter and would much rather be inside a warm building learning rather than participating in the winter ritual of snow shoveling (or blowing if you are lucky enough to have a snow blower).
Therefore, I actually like going to school during the winter versus going to school in the summer. In the winter I have far less social activities I would like to attend than in the summer. For Example, a group of my friends went sledding this past week on one of the snow days. I happen to hate sledding, it is cold, wet, and just quite unpleasant when you have cold air blasted into your face as you travel down a hill. I obviously skipped out on that adventure, but if it were summertime and I had been asked to go jet skiing or bodysurfing, I would have been all in because it's warm, fun, and I have plenty of sun exposure to work on that amazing tan of mine that lasts for most of the winter if I get dark enough.
Summertime is also my vacationing time, I was planning to go to Europe right after school ended, but now that the new school makeup days have decided to cut into my vacation time, I have to either ditch school on those days and break my perfect attendance record/take my finals early, or push my vacation back to the next available time that works for me, in early August.
Oh and then there is the thing about the seniors, which is totally stupid, but I will totally dig next year. They don't have to make up all of the snow days, because the graduation date is already set for them, this really pisses us juniors off because this was a year with a lot snow days and we totally envy that. Next year we probably won't have any snow days and we will walk around sulking the entire time, because that's just the way it works, luck is not in the favor of my class.

Huh? What do you mean?

I've come to believe that some people need extra special clarification on a lot of stuff. People only half listen sometimes and it really comes back to bite them on the ass when they do it. When ever I come into contact with this habit in many of my friends, I have come to believe that when people do this, they are not truly trying to be mean and misunderstanding of you, but they just have quite short attention spans that need refocusing. Or like cases it can be caused by pure rudeness, a fact that all of us have to face from time to time.
I recently was one of these rude not listening people, a friend was on the phone with me and was going on and on for about two hours over her problems with her boyfriend and other people not being fair to her. I had tried to give this conversation the slip multiple times by using my superior talent of making excuses, but with this girl it was no use, I just had to stay on the phone with her until she was done with me.
I'm generally not a multitasker, but when I'm half listening I can do like five things at once. Being on the phone with her for like an hour got me really really bored quite fast and sensing no end to the conversation I soon plugged in my ipod to my other ear and turned it down low enough that I could hear it but she couldn't. This soon evolved to the checking of my facebook while tuning in and out of the conversation and every once and a while mumbling something supportive.
By the time I was at the max of my multitasking, I was working on my paper for school, while watching TV, chatting on facebook, listening to my ipod, and ultimately talking on the phone. I was quite surprised that I could carry on like this because my genetically inferior male brain is not meant for stuff like this. But boy could this girl talk.
At some point during the conversation I was severely caught of guard when a question was brought to my attention, that didn't have a yes or no answer option.
I seriously thought I was gonna get caught before I pulled out the best trick thought up by guys around the world, I answered with the phrase, "I don't know, how do you feel about that?"
Then followed it up with a "Yeah I know what you mean."
It was truly the perfect deception, I gave her the impression that I was not only listening fully, but I was paying attention to her feelings. It's quite crazy that my trick actually worked but thank god it did or I would have probably gotten the cold shoulder for about a week.

Marching in Florida

Florida is an amazing place in the winter compared to Iowa, 85 degrees on Monday and in the mid seventies for the next five days. Our hotel was amazing, five stars and we actually had three rooms in our hotel suite. Like always the beds are soft and the pillows fluffed. I realized about halfway through our trip that we were actually using air conditioning in our hotel room, for some reason these was amazing to me, especially since it was winter and in Iowa we had our heater cranked up.
The view from our hotel room was over an amazing couple acre golf course, the pool, hot tub, volleyball and tennis courts. It was quite beautiful and reminded me of a very picturesque painting. I was quite overwhelmed by the fact that I was staying in a beautiful five star hotel with about twenty good friends and a hundred others. On top of all that I had successfully made my first ever flight without my parents being there.
We all looked forward to the amazing week in paradise, though it would have been wonderful to have a few hours just to relax at the hotel. We got to go to the MGM studios, Planet Hollywood, Downtown Disney, EPCOT, Animal Kingdom, and the Magical Kingdom, all in a four day period. We went to Cocoa Beach on the very last day, though it was only 65 degrees and like a lot of other people I opted out of swimming because of the freezing temperature of the water.
The only downside many of us saw to the week, was the fact that we had to march in two different parades in the same day, totaling a distance of about six miles, in seventy-five degree weather. Our marching uniforms are made out of wool and they are quite thick. In fact they are designed to keep us as warm as possible, in Iowa, that isn't such a bad thing, but in Florida, oh god we were sweating before we even had our uniforms on.
The Citrus Bowl Parade we were in was a disaster, half the band was out of step and it was televised, we barely even knew our music, but somehow we got through it. The Magical Kingdom parade, was AMAZING, it was probably the most beautiful thing I've seen in a long time. We marched down the streets of Disney towards a fully lit Disney castle and I think we played perfectly every time. We were all astonished by the thousands of people inside Disney watching us and after the parade our band teacher who was on the verge of tears made a speech about how proud of all of us doing such a wonderful job that day. I swear if one more thing would have happened we all would have been in tears.

Being Sick

The worst part about being sick is the fact that you can't work out worth shit.
I've had this horrible cough for the past week and a half and I went to the doctor and got my finger pricked, "ouch," and was test for both mono and walking pneumonia. Luckily they both came back negative, but that also means that since they don't know how to treat me I basically have to fight this sickness off by myself without the help of any antibiotics or anything.
With my testing for tae kwon do less than a month away I'm getting really nervous because me being sick means I can't get into the gym to workout as often. I tried going in to work out a couple of times this week by all of the trials have resulted in me feeling really weak like I'm going to conk out, after a minor workout of about thirty minutes. Thus basically I've had another two weeks taken off of my possible time to work out before I test. Last week when I went to Florida I hadn't had anytime to workout the five days before, during Christmas week, and then all the time I was in Florida I couldn't get a decent workout besides the five minutes of crunches plus the forty or so kicks I did at night. Because there was limited free time and we got back to our hotel room after midnight every night, me being able to work out was basically out of the question.
The plus side to me being sick, is that I actually have been getting homework done a bunch of time ahead of when it is due, so have more time apparently helps with my major procrastination of everything. I guess I'm just getting bored of having a lot of extra time and not doing anything at all.
The week after I'm healthy again is going to be a tough week, I'll most likely try and cram at least two hours of work out a day in, plus my two hundred sit ups and push ups a day. If I don't pass my testing in February I have to test in June, and then test again in November, and I'll miss the cut off date for the testing in June of 2012 by like four months, so it would be best if I pass next month and then test and pass in June, because I'll be going for Junior Master (fourth degree black) in June 2012 then.