Category: Education

This week has felt so rushed and stressful since AP tests are coming up. I finished writing my 5-page research paper, and I’ve never felt so relieved. I was apprehensive that I would not be able to turn in my assignments on time, and I am currently doing some at the moment as well. Eventually, I studied some old AP exam questions, and I had placed a timer to help me manage my time with each item. I taught myself to remain calm under pressure, and I’ve been improving quite a bit; I hope to get at least a three on the physics exam. Also, I’ve been finishing the long assignments before deadlines and complete the short ones for later, leaving off with extra days just to chill. Hopefully, my hotspot remains to have stable and fast wifi for the rest of the week. I am with my dad up north, and shockingly, the local people in this small town are not wearing any masks or anything. Only the cashiers were wearing them, and I felt a sense of tension and awkwardness when my mom and I were the only ones protected. On the other hand, it’s been very chilly here, and I was able to spend time with my whole family. My dad brought us to where he works, what he specialized in, and what types of things he does daily. It made me feel closer to him knowing how it’s not an easy job in my point of view, but it is also hazardous since there are many rattlesnakes, scorpions, and wild boars roaming around. On the other hand, I’ve been distracting myself with social media, and I’m also studying so much that I figured out how easy physics and math can be once you get the hang of it. I would always hesitate and give up once I’d see a long word problem or equation, but I’ve taught myself to try and engage in solving the problem, and I’ve returned to loving math now. I still stumble on remembering formulas and forgetting to put the decimal in the correct spot. Again, I understand lessons better than before, instead of immediately asking for my friends if they knew how to do it. Alth

Things are going better since last week. I had a borderline anxiety attack last week and doubted everything and just wanted to stay in bed, but that seems to have passed for this week and hopefully for a while. The only things I did for the school were my final essay for English, a piece about the perception of the United States in other countries which details some of the origins of hostilities and partnerships such as the many coups the United States has sponsored in the past which caused hostilities with other countries most notably in Iran (the United States and the United Kingdom overthrew the Prime Minister and installed a monarchy which was incredibly corrupt and led to the Iranian Revolution which held the United States as a major source for the problems Iran faced). The other thing I did for school was the final project for my education class, which was about speech and language impairments and how they affect the classroom. In personal news, I completed the first three Super Mario Bros. games plus The Lost Levels and am currently playing through Super Mario World and The Legend of Zelda. My opinion is that Super Mario Bros. is a great game that deserved success. Also, it arguably saved the video game industry from not existing at all since the video game crash of 1983 (the crash was so bad that a landfill of unsold games was found in New Mexico). Super Mario Bros. 2 is a completely different game that is owed to the fact that it was originally not a Mario game at all but was, in fact, a reskin of the game Doki Doki Panic, which series creator Shigeru Miyamoto worked on. The original Super Mario Bros. 2 was what the USA refers to as Super Mario Bros. The Lost Levels, which was considered too difficult for most audiences and as such Super Mario Bros 2. was created (in fact, the port of Super Mario Bros. 2 is referred to as Super Mario Bros. USA). Even though Super Mario Bros. 2 is a much different game than the first, I think it is just as good as it. The gameplay, while different, is still good, and the game as a whole had a massive impact on the Mario series as a whole with the introductions of characters/enemies such as Shy Guys, Birdos, Pokeys, and Bob-ombs as well as character designs. Super Mario Bros. 3, in my opinion, begins strongly, but by the end of the game, it just felt like a slog. The core gameplay was great, but by world 7, I stopped having as much fun with it. It’s not that the game became difficult, it’s mostly that some of the level design just didn’t feel all that great. It doesn’t help that all the boss fights are pathetically easy; you just have to jump on them three times. It is effortless to chain together jumps at the right time to beat them in a matter of seconds. While the final boss fight against Bowser is supposed to be difficult (you are meant to make him shatter the floor and make him plummet to his defeat) if you have the Hammer Bros. Suit it just takes about five hammers to defeat him. I think most of the issues I have with these games are that I am more used to the more recent games, and many of the established rules had yet to be established. Super Mario Bros.: The Last Levels was the worst of the games I completed, it was difficult for the sake of it, and it brings down the fun aspects of the gameplay, which is just the original Super Mario Bros. The idea behind the game was that it was meant to be challenging for those who mastered the first game, the issue is the level design at points feels like it was meant to just be difficult and not fun which defeats the point of most games (even games like Dark Souls which is notoriously difficult are fun as the way the game is designed is meant to make it feel like the player is learning as they feel and mastering the game, the plot of the game is even tied into this design with the lore only being brought together with details that come from the repeated failure). Despite the difficulty, I beat the game, and it was not worth it. In regards to plot, all non-RPG Mario games are light on the plot, so it doesn’t matter (I normally enjoy games with strong narratives such as the Red Dead series or The Wolf Among Us, but Mario games have never been about the plot, and the gameplay is usually good enough to make up for it. As a side-note Super Paper Mario had the best plot of any Mario game and is surprisingly dark for a kids game which can be seen when the character is sent to stand-ins for Heaven or Hell [the in-game Hell is more akin to the Hades of Greek myth, but the Heaven stand-in is based on the Judeo-Christian interpretation of Heaven] and we witness entire worlds be erased from existence unceremoniously, some of the characters being ones that the player may have liked, and none of which appear in the afterlife which is itself about to be erased). Super Mario World is shaping to be my favorite of the games I recently completed and of the few Legend of Zelda games I have played the first one is not my favorite but the other games I have to compare it to are Ocarina of Time, Breath of the Wild, and The Wind Waker which are the some of the most acclaimed of the series and some of my favorite games of all time. Another game I am playing is Red Dead Redemption II; I am currently doing my second playthrough of the game. The original game is my favorite game of all time, and in my opinion, it’s prequel is better in some ways but worse in others. Red Dead Redemption has better gameplay, but Red Dead Redemption II has a better plot and better overworld, which includes the majority of the original game’s map in greater detail.  

As from today, May 8, they officially opened the Barbershops, Hair salon, and Nail salon. I’m thrilled that they already permitted the hair salon to reopen because I needed a hair cut immediately. When I heard that they were going to close the hair salon, I was so depressed because I was going to have to wait to cut my hair until they reopened the hair salon to be able to cut my hair once again. Due to the hair salon being closed, I had to wait eight weeks until they reopened the hair salon and was approved for people to go and cut their hair. So now that the hair salon and barbershops are open, I’m delighted because now I can go to cut my hair. When going to cut my hair in the hair salon, I have to wear a face mask to be able to get inside the hair salon. Second I have to sing my name in a notebook and wait until they call so I can get my hair cut and put germ-X. Third, the only time I was allowed to take off my face mask was when the lady was going to trim my beard. What I love about going to cut my hair is that they treated me with respect and they followed the COVID-19 guidelines so no client