Rick's Thoughts

First Impressions

2006-04-13T11:38:00.000-07:00

I thought that "First Impressions" was a very interesting article. I never realized the trouble that people went through when they imegrated here. I thought that the only troubles that they faced were because of U.S. Custems and some people that were prejudas against foregners. But I nerver thought that coming to this country ment that you were almoist forced to spend your hard erned money to look like an American.

The Last Paper in This Class

2006-04-06T15:57:00.000-07:00

For the argumentative paper I will be arguing that we should build a new nuclear power plant rather than a coal fire power plant in Southeastern Michigan. The basis of this paper is the fact that DTE will have to build a new base load power plant in Metro Detroit within the next five to ten years in order to keep up with demand. This plant will most likely be coal fire since DTE is traditionally coal and unfounded public fears about nuclear power. But a new nuclear power plant is being considered at the current Fermi 2 site.

Garden City Library: Final Draft

2006-03-31T16:10:00.000-08:00

The City council of Garden City has recently been considering to close down the Library in order to reduce cost. Currently Garden City has a 1.8 million dollar deficit that they are trying to reduce. The Garden City Library has served this city since 1956 and a lot of the residents do not want to see the Library closed down. Even though Library servaces are proposed to be contracted out to another community, Garden City residents especially senior citizens are unhappy because of the convenience of where the current Library is located.

A large group of citizens are going to city council meetings to protest the proposal of closing the library. With the help of Friends of the Library some citizens are organizing their protest. Some are putting up signs in front of their houses around the city in order to gain more support for this cause. This sign was placed behind the Garden City Library and there are others just down the block that are on private property. Garden City residents are also writing to the Garden City Observer and other local papers.

The staff at the Garden City are also participating in the effort to keep the library open. They have lawn signs that they are giving away but they are also asking for donations to help purchase signs and to pay for other protesting expenditures. They keep people informed when the council meeting are and they also have petition froms for citicins to sign.

The Garden City Library is an ecential part of the city. They have plenty of space for people to read, study or research for school or any other reason they might need this space. The library also has different programs for the childeren that live in the city. Some examples are STORYTIME, NITE TALES, READ-TO-ME and the SUMMER READING CLUB. These programs are designed to help children become more interested in reading and using their imaginaton while reading stories rather than be hooked on watching TV all day.

Friends of the Library is also organizing meetings for concerned citizens so they could be better organized for future council meetings. The next council meeting is April 3, 2006 and Friends of the Library and concerded citizens will be there to keep the pressure on the city council to keep the library open. City council will be making a final decision on the fate of the Garden City Library before the beginning of the new fiscal year on July 1, 2006. It would be a sad day in Garden City if the library were to be shut down. Even though its sevices would be contracted out to another community, it would not be the same to many residants.

Our Fortified Ghettos

2006-03-21T12:36:00.000-08:00

Vergara is refering to the fact that you will only find bars over the windows, bricked in or glass bricks for the first floor windows and plexiglass are all types of barriers houses that are in poor neiborhoods. I think that it takes matterial form because, again, this only takes place in the poor neiborhoods. You would never see something like this where I live. My neiborhood is all middle class and not even a single house has these types of barries on them. I don't think that this is so much inequallity because it is there choise to do this. No one is telling them to do this but they do it to have a sence of security. Yes it probably curbs some crime but there are still ways that a theif could get into the house if they wanted to. Where I live there are mostly the same types of crime that go on, but there is less of it. Even though that crime is still present there is not any movement to get these types of fortifications done to our houses.

Marvin! Hennessy!?

2006-03-21T12:19:00.000-08:00

This add with Marvin Gaye in it is probably not the best way to advertise. Unless your going for the angle that Hennessy is the choise of "professional drinkers".

Film Review Rough

2006-03-09T11:11:00.000-08:00

Well after watching the movie crash for the third time I think I have a pretty good handle on the plot and the characters of the movie. I finnally was able to complete my rough draft and I do mean rough. I have never written a film review before and even after reading several reviews online I'm still unsure about writing one. I guess I'll have a "crash" cource in class today and when I get my draft back from Bill. I can't wait to see how my work is to everyone else!

Let a hundred Cities Bloom

2006-03-08T12:28:00.000-08:00

This article written by Peter Shaw is very interesting. His views seem to be put forth more out of emotion than any rational thought or reassures. There are way too many generalizations such as him suggesting that everyone on well fare wants to stay on welfare and that the suburbanites want to keep welfare in order to keep those lower class people away from them. This is certainly not the case for everybody, although I am sure there are people on welfare and there are suburbanites that do feel this way. Some of his ideas were ok but could have been better if they were thought out more. The idea of putting more cops on the street was an alright suggestion but when he says that New York Time Square would have been cleaned up in only six hours because of heightened police presence, that was a little far fetched. Other ideas were just plane retarded, for example suggesting to kill all of the city planners and then going back and saying to keep them but do exactly opposed of what they say. Reading his article, with his arrogance and tone of voice, completely turned me off from what he had to say.

"Sounds Like Pompos"

2006-02-23T13:10:00.000-08:00

In this restaurant review it was mostly what a review would be, talkng about the food and whether it was good or not. But the thing that caught my attention was the fact that Jane Slaughter did some research on the side. She e-mailed a Brizilian friend to see how authentic the food was. When I go to Italian restraunts I don't give that aspect any thought at all. But I guess some people do and to make a good review you must know something about the foos that is offered. Then latter on in the review she starts to rip appart the food at this restaurant. On each selection she tells her exact thoughts "Spicy chicken tasted only of a rather cheap hot sauce". That was a tough blow to a restaurant owner.

Live From Death Row

2006-02-09T10:19:00.000-08:00

After reading this essay written by Mumia Abu-Jamal I have very mixed feelings twords him. The first thing that caught my attention was that he relates all of the hardships that he has been through related to racism. He was convicted of murder because of a racist judg eand jurry and not given certain rights in prison. I feel that he was saying that the only reason that he was convicted of murder was because he was black. He also tries to provide some numbers on how many black inmates there are as apposed to white inmates and tries to use this as evidence that the system is racist. I look at those numbers and think about other factors that could produce these numbers to see if it is actually racism. There is some truth in the fact that there are some people that are unfortunatly racist but they certainly are not a majority of the US population. I think about statistics that I have seen in the past and things about poverty and crime rates and places that I have been that could help me to see if his claims are justified in my mind.
I came up with a different with a different explanation. Most of the people are a product of their environment. That means that if you grow up in a neighborhood that has a high crime rate then you will most likely become involved in this crime to put it simply. Although there are many variables that influence which direction an individual is going to take. Most crimes are comitted in large cities such as Detroit, New York and Chicago. It is in these areas that the percent of the poplulation that is black moves to be more equal to the other races. This would explane why there is such a high percentage of blacks that are in prison when compaired to the percent makeup of the national population. He completely loses me with his argument and I do not hold him credable.
The other argument that I do not agree with him on is that he is not given enough time out side or that he cannot touch his family when they visit. I'm sorry but you are a convicted murderer. these people do not deserve to be given the same priveliges that you have outside of the prison walls. The man that was killed is no longer around to even be seen by his family. He is lucky that he can see and talk to his family because there is another family that cannot ever see one of their members again.
The one part that I do somewhat belive him was about the racism that took place in the prison itself. Though it might be exadurated a little, there is no excuse for any racism to occur anywhere. The story about being put into cages while the white prisoners played basketball was something that made me think of the south while it was still segregated. Its the same thing and this activity at any degree is total ignorance on the part of the guards that did this.

Homeplace

2006-01-17T10:51:00.000-08:00

After reading Bell Hook's it kind of struck me as outragious. I guess I just have not read any first hand accounts about how bad racism really was back then. Yeah I have seen things on TV and read in text books about how black's were treated but i guess it dosn't compare, to me anyway, to what a first hand account sounds like. Throughout some of this account it sounded so bad all the time that it seemed like it was exadgerated a little bit. But I guess if you grow up in a place where racism is a problem you would probably tend to notice it more and maby even think that it is pressent when its not, which I personally have seen at some of my jobs.
The concept of "homeplace" that she describes is interesting though. She talks about it as a way to not just get away from the racism that is faced everyday but it is also used to lift the "moral", I guess you could say. As long as they had a homeplace they had somewhere that they could completely get away from it all just for a little bit. She also speaks highly of her mother who created this homeplace for her children and all the other black woman that have done so.
The ending of this was very odd to me. She talks as if black woman today still have to go through the strugles of racism. I personally don't see it except for the occasional encounter with someone that actually is a racist. I have a couple of friends that are black and I am the only white person at one of my jobs and even then I still do not see or hear anything remotely racist. I think that most racism today is contain in the figment of someones imagination.

"Four Things"

2006-01-16T13:27:00.000-08:00

Four jobs you've had in your life:
1. Bagger/Stock Boy/Cashier and Meat Clerk at Bob's of Canton-Westland
2. Service Support (unloading and loading the trucks) at Cintas
3. Rental vehicle Logistics specialist at Hertz (currently have)
4. Server in the catering dept. at The Henry Ford (currently have)

Four movies you could watch over and over:
1. The Patriot
2. Saving Privet Ryan
3. The Longest Yard
4. Memphis Bell

Four places you've lived:
1. Garden City
2. Sault St. Marie, MI (I lived on campus at Lake Superior State University my first two years of college)

Four TV shows you love to watch:
1. Family Guy
2. Anything on the Discovery channel, History channel and the Military channel

Four places you've been on vacation:
1. Phoenix, AZ
2. Gettysburg
3. Outer Banks of North Carolina
4. Everywhere up north

Four favorite foods:
1. Anything Seafood
2. Lamb
3. Wild Game
4. Anything Pasta

Four places you'd rather be:
1. Greece
2. Australia
3. Somewhere warm and different

Four vehicles I've owned:
1. 17 years old - 99' Ford Ranger Sport ( loved it event's it did not have 4x4)
2. 19 years old and still have - 96' Ford Contour ( a great car, had to sign it over to my dad for a couple of years the insurance was crazy high )
3. 20 years old - 88' Ford Crown Victoria ( This was totaled after two years, people don't know how to drive in bad weather)
4. 22 years old ( 1 week after the Crown Vic's demise) - 90' Buick Skylark ( I hated this car but it was cheap and I needed a car fast, I got rid of it 6 months later when my Contour was paid off)

The Drive

2006-01-16T13:05:00.000-08:00

I drove through my city the other day to see what I could see. There's not much going on in Garden City. I noticed that there are a few houses for sale, more than usually. Normally I only see two or three houses for sale but that day I saw about twelve within about a square mile. That was a lot. Makes me wonder why all of these people are wanting to leave my city. Its not a bad city, no much crime and it looks decent similar to Westland and Dearborn. Other than that there was not much to my city that day. Another day in Garden City.

"Nikki's Window"

2006-01-12T10:58:00.000-08:00

I just finished reading "Nikki's Window"and it was very interesting. It brought forth some thoughts that I have had in the past about Detroit. Certain parts of Nikki's Window remind me of what has happened with my mother's side of my family. My grandparents immigrated from Greece and settled in Detroit near Greek Town. After my mother and her brothers and sisters grew up everyone moved out of Detroit to live in the suberbs. The only time that we go to Detroit now is to go to Greek Town on occasion to go to the restraunts and bakeries. It is very dissapointing to me that Detroit has become this way. But people like Dennis Kefallinos who are able to succeed in Greek Town Detroit may hold the possibility that Detroit may be able to improve. But I'm sure that eventhough Dennis's restraunt is very succesful, he probably lives outside the city as well.

2006-01-10T13:05:00.000-08:00

This is a test. This is only a test.