Who cares about gold???

An interesting question that mann brings up is, why is gold so sought after and expensive. I have actually wondered this myself because gold has no practical purpose. Its very heavy and very easily bent or shaped, this renders it useless for construction or weaponry. The only real purposes it has are decoration and currency. so why do people want it so much? The one unique feature it has is its malubility, if done the right way you can have a sheet of gold one atom thick. This still doesn't serve any real practical purpose other that decoration.

A major reason we think that America was sparsly populated before colombus is because In some cases ninety per cent of Native american tribe populations were decimated by small pox. Those that were left were just a skeleton of what had once been a thriving culture. This is a perfect example of Jared diamonds Guns germs and steel theory. The Native americans had never encounterd small pox so they had no defense against it in their immune systems.

Manns writing is sometimes very hard to decipher sometimes. the point i was talking about in the paragraph above was written very factually and i had to read it atleast twice before I completely understood it. I like reading this book but it is very filling reading I think it will take me a very long time to finish.

1492 cont.

As i have said before, taking AP world has really helped me to better understand what i am reading. This material is very similar to Guns Germs And Steel by Jared Diamond which i read in that class. Both authors write in a very systematic scientifis way.

In guns germs and steel Jared Diamond says that the reason one society is more succesful than another is because of their Relation with Guns (weaponrary) Germs (disease and famine) and steel (advancements and availability of metalurgy). Mann Bassically points out that the Americas are often over looked because people assume that its societies were primitive and had no impact on the world around them. while Native Americans may not have all these advancements they were still a pevelant cultur with huge settlements, politics, small scale military, religion etc... theyre over looked mostly because they didnt keep records.

An interesting fact that I remember is that North America had a larger population than any European country, before 1645. Also tenochtitlan, the aztec capitol had a larger population than any Wuropean city befor 1492. This is actually really strange to me because before i read this book i thought of the Americas before columbus as a vast wilderness sparsley populated by humans.

The siriono

One thing I really like about Mann is that he knows that archaeologists and other "science types" often have very flawed and poorly opinionated views. "But flaws in perspective often appear obvious only after they're pointed out. In this case they took decades to rectify." In this passage he's talking about an archaeologist from the 1940's who lived and observed the Siriono. He basically clamed that they were just short of barbaric and very inefficient at survival and have no form of government or infasturcture.

Iv'e learned alot about how native Americans affected thier enviroment. Iv'e heared about brush fires but i didn't know they could be used for good. Native Americans particularly, in North America (not tropical regions.) made controlled brush fires. They used these fires to keep the forest healthy and keep the forest clear of scrub vegetation so they could hunt easily.

I wish i could post these pictures I found in the book. theyre an ariel shot of a landscape in Bolivia where the forest was cleared. The land had been turned in to catle ranches in the 1950's but if you look at it from an over head view you can see that it had been home to a long forgotten society. The shape of the land is patterned in a way that looks faintly like the city plans of a place like Rome.

this book has really spike my interest in Anthropology and archaeology. I'm really interested in ancient civilizations and its cool to read about civilizations you didn't even know existed.

and you thought the native americans were all natural

I'm actually really suprised that I can understand this language, it has so much information and all of it is very densely packed. "stated so badly, this notion-that the indgenous people of the Americas floated changelessly through the millennia changelessly until 1492." If I was a little less expierienced, (not to sound pretentious) this statement would have tripped me up. Mrs embry's AP world class gave me alot of practice reading matierial like this.

The Author has a kind of whimsical tone, he sometimes puts a little bit of humor and whit in his writing. For example theirs a passage where hes talking about a tree that lives symbiotically with ants. So the tree is covered with ant's. the writer says " the ants attack anything that touches the tree-insect, bird, unwary writer." This kind of writing is nice because it provides comic relief from the educational "boring stuff."

The first group of people he describes are known as the Siriano. The Siriano are relevent because the terraformed their suroundings. The planes they live on flood with about six inches or more of water. The sirano and the indeginous people that lived their form a system of mounds and raised pathways, over hundreds of years. This had great benifits mainly for hunting because animals would be isolated on these mounds. And you thought Native Americans didn't effect thier surroundings.

1491

My sister suggested this book to me beacause i usually like history and its also a non-fiction book. The bassic point of the book is to explain to the reader what life and civiliazation was like in
America before columbus, and to clear up the misconception that Native Americans had no effect on thier surroundings, or advanced societies.

The language in this book seems very dense and hard to read, each sentence contians lots of information. The author tells the sort of a story from his point of view. he relates everything with the modern day and tells a lot about the actual sites he visits.

most of what he looks for is evidence of land being shaped, by humans. in one of the first chapters he talks about a giant mound made of broken pottery, this was the equivalent of a modern trash heap, rivaling that of a huge civilization like rome.

reading the body rights of the nacerema, has kind of affected how i look at this text. when I see phrases like, "culturally backwards" i ask myself is this really true. the Author is also very concious of this and constantly supports his reasoning.

The subtitle in this book is "a savage jouney to the heart of the American dream." I dont really understand how this represents the Amereican dream, unless the american dream is not what i thought it was. maybe i need to read farther or look deeper into the book.

The author frequently makes class and social status observations "...special guests of the GM nothing to good for the high rollers." this is obviously a sarcastic comment and afterwards he goes on to condemn the upper class. when he makes the comments however he always does it in a very back handed way. he never strait up says high rollers are pigs.

Its amazing how irresponsible the main characters are, they drive around Vegas "with a car full of marijuana and a head full of acid." this shows the characters disregard for authority and law. I'm not really sure why he so reckless although the story does indicate that he is depressed.

This book doesn't really fallow the common structure that most books do. their is little real conflict, most of it is just imagined by the main characters in their drug addled state. it sort of feels like the book has no direction. pretty much all that has happened is they have wondered around las Vegas doing a whole bunch of drugs.

"When speeding past a law enforcement officer it is neccessary to accelerate. When he pulls out behind you and turns on his lgihts, it is neccessary to turn on you blinker. This will confuse him, however it is to let him know you are looking for an appropriate place to pull over and talk." this is a perfect example of the zaney writing style Hunter thompson uses. Im not sure if he was drug addled when he wrote this or if he's rying to be clever.

I can relate to allot of cultural observations he makes. take this one for example. both their buggies were covered with ominous symbols: screaming eagles carrying American flags in their claws." although he never outright says it, it's pretty obvious that he thinks this is tacky. and i
couldn't agree more.

both characters seem very irritable and aggressive (probably because of the drugs.) like the scene where they are getting the shotgun mike, the attorney threatens to kill the store owner and burn down his house. also their is another scene where the author fires his driver just for making him spill his drink.

I wonder how this book could even be made into a movie. it doesn't really have enough substance that can be seen. most of it is observation which an pretty much only be read. I bet its allot different.

I wonder if this story is true. several people have told me that its and autobiography and several have told me that it's not. there are some really cool illustrations of the authors hallucinations. They're really sloppily drawn, kind of like a chicken scratch drawing from a third grader, but they're really cool. I wonder if that's what tripping is like.

The author seems very miserable... he is constantly on drugs to the point where he cant function. like when they're driving to Vegas he has to stop because he sees a flock of bats. also when he gets to the Mint hotel, he thinks that everyone is a reptile and the blood is all over the ground. I have read over a hundred pages and he is not sober in a single scene. they are also constantly paranoid about something, for example when they go to the motor cycle race, everyone has a gun, which scares them so they leave.

I think whats happening is that hes a journalist who's supposed to be writing about the Mint motorcycle race but i can't be quite sure. the authors writing style is very quirky and a Little hard to fallow. Allot like Kurt Vonnegut. He focuses on details and quirks that aren't really all that necessary to the story. he also uses amusing analogy's like "it was like trying to cover a swim meet in an Olympic sized pool filled with talcum powder instead of water.

fear and loathing in las vegas

I think the redeeming value of fight club is the theological aspect of it. The point of the book is that self destruction is the only way to start anew. the purpose of project mayhem was to destroy the world so we could start over from scratch. This may not sound practical but it would work theorhetically. If we looked back a million years from now we will either see that most life disappears suddenly (archaelogically sudden that is), or that life will thrive. Humans are really one of the largest influences on the planet.

This week I started reading fear and loathing in Las Vegas. Its supposed to be really good and i want to see the movie after i read the book.

My first impressions of the two main characters; the Narrator and his attorney, are that they are total druggys. "We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of

high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half-full of cocaine and a whole galaxy
of multicolored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers...etc" Its a bit hard tow discern reality from hallucination in this book butt basically a jounalist (and a very iresponsible one) and his lawyer are on their way to las vegas to do a task that hasn't been explained yet.

and i used to be such a nice person

Another sructural aspect of Palahniuk's writing that i have noticed is how he uses repitition through out the book. The narrator says "and i used to be such a nice person." after he freaks out on his boss and again sixty two pages later when he blackmails the head of the pressman hotel. He does this several times throughout the book. Its a really cool effect.



One thing iv'e noticed is that The narrator and Tyler are never in the same room with Marla (the narrators love interest). you can sort of see this in the movie but in the book it's much more obvious. When ever Marla leaves the room, Tyler magically appears. this must have to do with his multiple personality disorder.



I really like the soap idea. Its a very clever scheme. bassically what happens is people from project mayhem (the terrorist orginization thought up by Tyler) go to a medical wasted dump. there they gather up fat "liposuctioned fat sucked out of the richest thighs in america." they use this fat to make soap (and glycerin for nitroglycerin). which they sell at twenty bucks a bar.



I think I want to do my annotated bibliography on the differences between fight club; the book, and the movie. I dont know if i would be able to coe up with enough sources though.

The actual fight club starts out when the narrator hits tyler Durden in the parking lot of a bar. "Both" men experience something they never have before. Tyler Durden sets up fight club in the basement of the bar. at first its just them two but it steadily gains popularity untill their are two many people for just one fight club, and they have to start setting up new ones in other bars.

The over all theme of this book is that self destruction is the answer. only when you have hit rock bottom can you be great. "it's only after you have lost everything that you are free to do anything." you can see this in the goal of project mayhem. The goal is to end civilization so it can become new again.

The narrator's "decline" is evident in a scene where his boss confronts him about a paper with the rules of fight club on it that he found. "I say, it sounds like some dangerous psychotic killer wrote this and this buttoned-down schitzophrenic could probably go over the edge at any moment in the working day and stlak from office to office with and armalite AR-180 carbine gas operated semiautomatic." This really shows you how much he's changed since the beggining of the book and turned into a monster.

the second rule is you dont talk about fight club

Chuck Palahniuk has a very wierd writing structure. he writes several one sentence paragraphs in a row.

"Death will commence in five.

Five, four.

Around her, parisitic life spray paints her heart.

Four, three.

Three, two."

Its kind of cool how he does this it speeds up the pace of the passage and allows him to change the subject frequently. Sometimes it's hard to fallow though.



Once the narrator meets Tyler Durden lots of crazy things start to happen. the craziest being that his apartment blows up. The narrator is on a buisness trip when it happens. The explanation given to him is that he blew the pilot light out on his stove which filled the room up with gas and when the bottom of his refrigerator got hot enough it exploded. This is when he moves in with Tyler durden.



One thing I dont really understand is how he interacts physically with Tyler Durden if he's just a hallucination. The scene where tyler pours lye on the narrators wrist to leave him a scar would be physically impossible without two people.

the first rule is you don't talk about fight club

This week I'm reading fight club. I've already ready seen the movie so I know the basic plot. I usually end up liking books alot more than the movie version but I have heard that the movie is better in this case. Its going to be interesting reading this book because i pretty much know what happens so I can look at the differences between the two. I can also look for foreshadowing in the story.

Chuck Palahniuk has a very dark writing style the first chapter is very morbid. The narrator is a depressed insomniac that goes to cancer support groups to cry and feel better about him self. so he's obviously screwed up. Reading about all 0f these terminally ill people is really depressing, reading about the narrator going to these support groups even though he isn't terminally ill is more depressing.

The first place I see fore shadowing is when he talks about Tyler Durden in chapter two. the narrator talks about waking up in several different airports. In between this he talks about Tyler's job as a movie projectionist. He constantly says "I know this because Tyler knows this" this is the first sign indicating he has a split personality.

I'm not totally sure but I think this is also foreshadowing that the narrator is skitzo. "in change overs you have two projectors and one projector is running. I know this because Tyler knows this. The second projector is set up with the next roll of film." This quote symbolizes how Tyler Durden and the narrator are two parts of the same thing.

Et ignotas animum dimittit in artes

the place in the book where they usually have the dedications has this printed. Et ignotas animum dimittit in artes. I wonder what this means.

I'm sure the last word means art but have know Idea about the others.

The story starts with once upon a time kind of children's tale. there are

lots of lyrics written in the first couple of pages too "oh the wild rose

blossoms on the little green place, oh the the green wothe botheth." i'm

pretty sure this is an Irish folk song because James Joyce is from dublin

so that would make since. The writing so far is very old sounding. It's

actually allot like the writing in J.R.R Tolkien's "the hobit." very light

and playful. there are often little anecdotes throughout the stories.

There is this conversation between Stephen (the main character) and

Nasty Roche (bully) where Roche asks if his father is a magistrate. I can tell

from the context that its supposed to be an insult but I don't understand why.

I have a feeling im not going to understand alot of things in this book.

There are also phrases like "he'd give you a toe in your rump for your self."

I think this translates too; He would kick your @%#. fairly sure.

A portrait of the artist as a young man

This book was sitting out facing me on my bookshelf so I've decided to give it a try. random books usually end up being some of the best because you don't know what to expect. for that same reason they can also end up being some of the worst.

the back of the book says it's a classic so I'm not sure if i'll be able to read it. classics and master pieces tend to be very boring. but im going to try and appreciate it. the book was published for the first time in 1916 so it will be interesting to see what the writing style of that time was. I bet it will have a much more advanced vocabulary than books of today. Its weird how older books seem to have better vocab than new ones.

The back of the book says it's about a rebelious young artist. Who disobeys his country for his work. I wonder if this means he ducked out of getting drafted into world war 1.

Unfortunatly i just realized its not a non-fiction book so i'll have to read two in a row. I really need some book suggestions if you have any.

One thing that really bothers me about Tucker Max's writing is how he constantly uses and then. He actually explains entire scenes using and then. this really gets boring and repetitive and is hard to pay attention to for to long. Listing events is not a very good way to tell a story it blurs things together and makes the purpose of writing unclear. a good analogy to describe this would be like building a tower by just nailing a long chain of wood together; very weak. I'm definitely going to make a conscientious effort to keep this out of my writing in the future.

Today i found a huge loop hole in "I hope they serve beer in hell" Tucker is telling a story about going to Vegas (blech) with his friend junior. They stop half way through their drive at a fast food restaurant called "in n' out" where they each eat two hamburgers. Later once they've arrived in Vegas they pick up their friend "slingblade." Once they start drinking he tells you that the alcohol and "in n' out" didn't sit well in "slingblade's" stomach. if you pay attention you'll realize that slingblade was in fact not with them when they ate at the restaurant so he couldn't have been sick from the burger that he did not eat. This might not be obvious to a less critical reader but it stuck out like a sore thumb to me.

I've decided that I can no longer force myself to read this book. It may be funny at times but the stories are too unbelievable for me to take seriously.

One thing that really bothers me about Tucker Max's writing is how he constantly uses and then. He actually explains entire scenes

I hope they serve beer in hell

A friend of mine lent me a book called i hope they serve beer in hell. techniquly its a non-fiction book but after reading it, hearing all the crazy coincedences and cliches, as well as a huge plot hole, I'm not so sure.

The book revolves around a notorious "player" named tucker max, and all his out landish friends. their personalities are so simple and predictable, its hard to believe any of it is true. the main focus of the book is how freakin' awesome Tucker Max is. this kind of writing might appeal to twelve year olds but not to me. "We [Junior and I] became friends because he is one of the few people i've ever met in my life who not only does better with women than I do-Way better, actually-but simply put, he can not only keep up with me, he can exceed me at times.not many people can."

All the stories go as fallows Tucker introduces the scene; makes a couple immature jokes about fast food or pooping; tell some crazy tale about how he was the center of attention and did some really manly or cool thing at a party, bar, cocktail party or conference center etc...; got really drunk; hooked up a randomn chick and triumphed at life; he then closes with a reflection of how awesome he is. this writing is unbearably predictable to the point where the reader questions its accuracy.

I haven't decided weather or not I'm going to finish this book yet. so far i dont really like it but we'll see.

I like the way Max brooks uses dramtic language like "the time has come to hunt the hunters." i'm a sucker for language like this. although its really cheesy it has a very bad *** effect. It reminds me alot of Bruce Willis movies like die hard. although they are not the finest forms of literature they are very entertaining.
Max Brooks Zombies remind me alot of these zombie ants that we read about in biology. the ants are taken over by a parasite, which controls all of there muscles. this is just like the virus in the zombie survival guide. the parasite forces the ant to climb up a tree and hang aproximatley 32 inches off the ground. Its amazing to me that a parasite could know something like how high it was off the ground.
"On the attack describes several strategys for killing zombies. the most interesting is "the barricade." This is gathering abunch of barbed wire and cars and things, luring zobies in and, over powering them with heavy artillery and incendiary weapons. this strategy rally shows max brooks "bruce willis" side. its a very cool idea and sounds like alot of fun.
I would really like to write a book like this. it requires lots of imagination and a very creative writing style.

on the attack

On the attack starts off with a narrative about a fictional attack in Omarama. Brooks shows off his skill once again writing like a well researched reporter, even though the story is completely made up. he uses a very fast paced writing style to excite the reader. "He entered; screams, moans, shots were heard; then nothing." the semi colons in the quote keep the reader from pausing and makes them take in all this information very quickly. The last phrase "then nothing." really knocks it out of the ball park for me. Its really not what you would expect but but it is so dramatic.
The rest of the passage tells the story of an unorganized zombie assault that resulted in all members of the party being burned alive. It grabs the readers attention, kind of smacking them in the face and implying, this could be you.
After this passage, Brooks adds a little disclaimer that adds lots of authenticity to the writing. "this chapter is designed to help plasn a civillian search and destroy mission. As stated before various government agencies will have their own equipment and doctrine (hopefully) for dealing with such uncoventional war." Passage's like these really allow me to sit back and forget that this book is fictional.

Personal narrative: rough draft Pete Nichols


This summer I went with my church's youth group to Guatemala. We went for ten days, three of which were home stays.
the time I spent there was truly life changing.
It seemed like days but we had finally arrived at the small town of Pana Winton. A small settlement, high in the eastern
mountains of Guatemala. At least half the homes are connected to family owned tiendas, which sell snacks and fruit that we
weren't permitted to eat because of our susceptibility to food born diseases. The largest buildings are simple dirt floor churches.
These churches are the center of the community. Anything from town meetings to soccer games are held there.

Stepping of the bus, I was immediately greeted by shabby flea bitten dogs. I reached out to touch them but they retreated as if I had attacked them. I later learned that dogs in poor regions of Guatemala are often beaten and starved, so they fear humans. We walked down a long winding path to a preacher’s house to have lunch. Looking out across the mountains, you can see hundreds of small scrap huts made of anything available. The preacher’s house stands in the middle of a cornfield. The small clay compound is home to countless children, animals and family members of the preacher.
While the house is very modest there is a make shift sauna in the back, its barely large enough to fit three people, but it shows how the attitude of these people is overwhelmingly positive.
Lunch was in what I would call the dining building, another small hut with miss matched tables in it. The hosts laid pine on the ground for us, a tradition done for special guests. They served us chicken soup with corn tortillas. It amazes me how much work was spent making food that so many of us barely touched, everything set before us was grown, harvested, washed, and prepared by the people.
After lunch we played games with the children. Games like duck duck goose, Frisbee and soccer. After an hour or so I was completely out of breath, the thin mountain air and the tireless

The colony

a couple nights ago I watched this show called "the colony". It really reminded me of the Zombie survival guide because its a simulation of a global catastrophe, and gives you survival advice. The premise for the colony is that a lethal virus killed spread across the gobe leaving few survivors. The participants have to over come simulated challenges and build a shelter for themselves.
In the episode I watched, the participants chose to build a shower, instead of building up fortifications and security for the warehouse they live in. Later on in the show an attack is simulated on the colony and they lose alot of there supplies, because the warehouse is not secure. This show is very similar to the zombie survival guide. It gives you lots of survival advice and tells you how to live in a fallout situation.
one very interesting section is about traveling through water. you would think that traveling through water is very safe, but zombies don't require oxygen to breath so if you stuck your hand in murky water you could easily get bitten by a zombie floating below the surface. Brooks give advice like staying in deep water, so that zombies cant stand up. he also says to watch your anchor line because zombies are quite capable of climbing up at night when you least expect them. there is a stern warning against relying on the water below you for food and water. this reminds me of kayaking magazines that I've read. they always tell you that water is often not as clean as it looks and may contain disease like dysentery so they are not a reliable source of energy.

on the defense

On the defense gives you advice on supplies and shelter. among the most important is to be off the ground. stilted houses, like the kind at the beach are prefferable. another option is to destroy the stairs. this works because zombies dont have the cognitave abilities to climb.

He also makes several lists of survival items to keep in your home. aswell as tips like filling your bath tub up to save water because in a survival situaion you dont know when the next oppurtuity will arise. The lists remind me alot of the emergancy stores in our basement. things like shake power flash light and canned food . Only ours doesnt contain a laser sighted rifle.

Brooks says the safest practical place to be in an outbreak is a warehouse. A warehouse is ideal because it is spacious and easily secured. the crates and supplies can be used aswell. This once again shows how much thought is put into writing this book. he disscusses numerous places to hide and gives great explanations for them, like this quote. "Building in poorer inner city nieghborhoods tend to be more secure than others, there reliance on razor wire bard windows and other anti crime features make them readiliy defencable...these affluent people rely more heavily on law enforcement and private security (unreliable sources during an outbreak)."

weapons and combat

chapter two discusses weapons and combat technique's. I really like the way Max Brooks inserts humor into the book. He sneaks it in very subtly. "When confronted with the living dead its easy to believe in the super commando strategy: load up with the heaviest and most powerful and go out to kick ass." It reminds you that this is not a serious book.

Brooks obviously spent alot of time "researching" (I use the term lightly because I don't know how much research can be done on zombie fighting). His explanations for using certain weapons over others is very well thought out, he spent much more time on this than I ever could. " the chain saw's lightning quick, rotating teeth can easily slice through flesh and bone... Its roar might also give the owner a much-needed psychological boost... in reality,however chainsaws and other power weapons rank extremely low on the list of practical zombie killing weapons." It's apparent that he spent alot of time thinking about the pros and cons of the chainsaw. This is what makes the book so good. He produce a thourough and well thought out well researched book on one of the most ridiculous subjects.

the zombie survival guide

The zombie survival guide is a fictional survival guide, only it focus with surviving hordes of the walking dead rather than tying knots. i really like this book because when I'm reading it ill catch myself thinking "I should keep this in mind just in case." Max Brooks does an amazing job convincing the reader that zombies actually exist. "Molotov cocktail: this term applies to any jar of flammable liquid with a primitive fuse. its a cheap effective way to kill multiple zombies a once.
the book starts off telling you exactly what a zombie is. Max Brooks's zombie is infected with a virus. The virus takes control of the host and turns them into a sencless savage that literally
cannot feel anything. all bodily functions cease including heart beat and breathing. Zombies are also completely brain dead and can't reason at all. They have a one track mind set on finding prey.
The virus can only be spread through fluidic contact. witch means you can only get the disease by being bitten or transfer through and open wound. once you are infected you will die and turn into a zombie 100% of the time. there is no cure for the disease.
The only way to kill a zombie is by shooting it in the head. A zombie will keep crawling towrd you even if all thats left is a head and shoulders, this mkes them very dangerous. this has alot of
influence on the book. later on when he discusses weapons this is the main thing he considers when picking the right weapon.