More About the Inauguration

I know I already talked about Obama's inauguration, but after reading the last two issues of Time, I found I actually had more to say about it (but not that much). Some people who like focusing on little issues ('little q', as Dr. H would undoubtedly say) lambasted Obama's inaugural address for the supposed lack of historical catchphrases. Since presidential speeches upon inauguration have only yielded timeless quotes twice, both by presidents known by a three letter acronym (FDR's "We have nothing to fear but fear itself" and JFK's "Ask not what your country can do for you, etc."), the perceived lack of such a phrase was not as crazy as some people have made it up to be. However, after reading two seperate articles that repeatedly quoted the speech, and after listening to the speech again and grading it with a rubric in IPC, I have found a few memorable quotes. They are:
"The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small but whether it works."
And
"What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them-that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply."
Both of them are lengthy quotes (I shortened the first one to make it more basic and memorable), but I think they underline everything that President Obama is all about. One of my friends, skeptical of Obama, said that Obama's "Change" message is stupid. "Change? What change? You want to be more specific?!" He has asked multiple times. These quotes outline the response to that question, which I know is not limited to my friend: Obama's 'change' is a change on a very basic level, a change on almost every layer of our existence. No more of the old "big gov't vs. small gov't" talk; no more of the focusing on the little q's. We need to change how we view others and how we view ourselves. We need to change our views towards war, science, religion, and politics. We need to come to a decision about our role in the world at large and decide how far we are willing to go, and how much we are willing to sacrifice, to feel secure. We need to change our government and how we view our government. We need a government that respects us and the Constitution from which it derives its power.
As Obama said, perhaps what skeptics like my friend fail to understand is that this change is already beginning.

Impressions

I haven't been able to post for awhile, so here are my impressions of Barack Obama's inauguration and the start of second semester.

I know the inauguration was ten days ago, but I just thought I'd bring up how ridiculous I find the concept of reading prayers at a Presidential inauguration for a country based upon freedom of religion. For some reason, I'm the only person I know who's bugged by this. Don't worry, I go to church a lot and am even a lector at my church, as well as being a huge fan of President Obama, but I believe in the words of Jesus (or was it St. Augustine?): "Give to God what belongs to God, and give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar."

Two weeks ago, I finally delved into the comic book masterpiece that is Hellboy. If your only knowledge of Mike Mignola's fantastic creation comes from the Guillermo del Toro movies, you MUST read the comics. I love them so much; maybe I'll put a real review up one of these days.

My second semester has been interesting so far. My IPC class is fun and exciting, and I really like my teacher. Health is quite possibly the easiest class I've ever taken, but I've learned a lot in the few days I've been there (even though I'm miffed that I can't take the SCUBA class next year). I actually like my new Euro class a lot; even though I was in 10th period for an entire semester, I still know more people in 9th than I did in 10th. I still have Drogos as my teacher, thank God. And I'm grateful I get to end the day with Guitar, another extremely easy class.

Finally, today I auditioned for a music show on WLTL with Boots and Pods. I was really nervous, especially during the interview (my experience as a lector helped the vocal section more than I could have reasonably expected). I should be informed of whether or not I made it tomorrow or Sunday, so expect to hear about it.

That's all for now.

Happy Birthday

It was this weekend, one year ago, that Bizarro World started. Whooo! Made it a year with more frequent updates than most! I'm not sure if this is the exact day, but today is the day after finals ended, and I remember that that's when I started this blog last year. In celebration, here's a pretty long post including New Years' Resolutions and other interesting tidbits.

New Years Resolutions (because I keep forgetting to do them)
-Get active: If I keep laying around doing nothing but reading and posting on this blog, I really will get fat and lazy. I'm going to try to run more this year over the spring, summer, and fall, and maybe work out more.
-Write some stories: As I type this, I am simultaneously typing stories for the school's literary magazine, Menagerie, and have a detailed plan for a story with one of my friends. This is the year I actually start writing my stories down.
-Get straight A's: Unfortunately, with a B in AP Euro first semester, this is not going to happen first semester. But since my second semester seems like it's going to be really easy, I'm going to really throw my full weight behind AP Euro in the attempt to get an A in every class. Let's do it!

That's all for now, folks!