First off, how did man come to be? Was it something that gradually happened a.k.a evolution or did God magically make us here on earth? No doubt there’s been many debates over these questions, but then again people are still uncertain. There just isn’t enough “evidence” of how we came to be.

Then there’s the question if we’re actually living right now. Ever wonder why you can only see out of your eyes and only see from your perceptive? Never can you see through someone else’s. That’s when everything becomes weird as if life isn’t real. Maybe we’re all living in a dream or a matrix world that we entered with no memory of the past. Perhaps we are reliving our life as we speak by entering this dream world and trying to live the way we wanted. Shows from Animatrix present some of these unanswerable questions and make us wonder even more if things are really happening…

So what is life really? Is it some sort of rhetorical question that can never be answered or is their some kind of mathematical relationship that can prove life. How do we know what’s really real. Only one things for sure, we can never know…

It was a Saturday night on the good ol’ Xbox 360 playing Call of Duty 4 (possibly the best game ever made). Three of my friends and I had a clan match against four of my other friends who were much better and at a higher rank than us. The game type was Hardcore Search and Destroy and the winner was determined by a best out of three. Being the underdog, our clan was nervous and doubtful that we’d win.

First round, the score was 4-1, us winning the first round. The entire online room went ballistic. The other clan, BARCODE, started talking a bunch of smack talk about how lucky we were and that they weren’t trying. Of course, a few of my friends talked some smack back and got the whole room rowdy. Once a game of friendly combat came into something serious.

Round two, the score ended in 1-4, us losing the second round this time. It was now overtime with the score being 1-1. After that round, more negative comments flurried the room. Again, as the underdog, our clan became even more nervous.

Finally, it was the last round. The one who reached 4 match wins would win the clan match. The first match belonged to ours as we took each of them out one by one with lucky grenade tosses and random shooting. The second round then became theirs as it was one person left vs me alone. I took a nervous jerk with my gun and missed my shot and died in the aftermath. Third match, we won as we played a real safe game by staying back and defending the bomb. Before we knew it, we won the last two matches and won the clan match. Happy and surprised, we said “Good Game.” However, as for the other clan, they immediately left the room angered and frustrated.

It’s apparent that they didn’t have a good nights rest as they had just lost a humiliating match against a lower ranking clan than their’s. Then, they began to threaten us by saying they’d beat us up and bring guns to school. Even though we knew they were lying, it still felt uncomfortable.

So, it’s apparent that games can make the evil come out of people whenever they lose. It’s sort of like online bullying in chat rooms and ect. Nevertheless, gaming is dangerous both mentally and physically, but mostly mentally.

You might ask why I would bother to bring this topic up. It’s basically because I saw an episode of FRIENDS where Rachel went out with this guy that was really close to his sister. In that episode, that guy took a bath with his sister and wrestled with his sister in a sexual kind of way.

*note (when I say relationship, I mean sexual relationship and things of that nature).

So, is it necessarily acceptable to be that close to a relative? I’m pretty sure hillbillies wouldn’t mind, but what about everyone else. In today’s society, people have such high standards of what to expect in life. For example, the usual marriage between man and women. Society has trouble accepting gay marriages and homogeneous relationships, but when brother and sister gets married or sexually active, the whole world goes nuts. No one no longer cares abouts gays and totally shun brother/sister deep relationship that exceeds physical barriers. Ultimately, people, especially young adults, either become grossed out or laugh at a relative-relative relationship.

In my point of view, I, without doubt, condemn any relationship of that kind and become disgusted right off the bat. I would absolutely ridicule that person that is having a relationship with their sister/ brother/ mother/etc. Just the whole situation is unacceptable in my view.

However, somehow I can tell that the future will begin to accept these kinds of relative related relationships. Not soon, but in the far future. Sooner or later, someone is going to bring this up and encourage society to accept this kind of relationship. Then again, people need to consider the story of Adam and Eve and how they populated the world. Did their children makes babies with their sisters/brothers/father/mother? Even though it’s a religious standpoint, you can’t help but wonder.

So, is it possible that this kind of relationship will come into acceptance in the future, or will it stay forever frowned upon? Just something to ponder about, something to wonder…

News had swarmed into the school building about how TAKS scores have finally arrived. Only one thing came into my mind, if I was commended on them meaning I mastered the topic. I didn’t necessarily worry whether or not I would pass as the TAKS test was not that difficult. I just wanted my scores to be very, very high.

As the day passed, only anxiety grew. With my seventh period teacher holding the scores, he slowing came towards each student to show them their grades on the TAKS test. Finally my turn had arrived. As my teacher addressed me, he pointed to where my name was, highlighted in bright yellow. As I read across each column, my row contained nothing but YES’s. This meant that I was commended on every subject: English, Math, Science, and US History. While listening onto other grades that did not get commended, I felt smart and fulfilled with a sense of achievement.

I had been commended on my last TAKS test. I had become filled with relief and joy!

For our sling, we used two strongly twisted rope and a pouch to hold the softball. We cut two small holes into the pouch, one on the right and the other on the left side. Next, we tied a knot of rope through the hole to connect both the pouch and sling. We did it again for the other hole but this time it was attached to a hook which was nailed into the arm. Then we made a small square hook to slip it through the cut at the top of the arm. This allows the pouch to stay in place until enough energy is produced to release the hook. With that done, our sling was complete!

We tested the sling out using manpower instead of weights as we were getting tired. Three, two, one, launch! Swoosh! The sling came in a complete arc and released the ball at the very top of its trajectory. The ball went flying over my roof (which was about 10 feet high) until it hit the tree behind it. My friends and I jumped and yelled with enthusiasm. Finally, we have finished. After four days of man labor and conflict, our machine was completer Our trebuchet was finished.

Later on this week, we will be filming our test launches from our trebuchet. Stay tuned and there’ll be a video post of our trebuchet in action. Fingers crossed that this machine launches the softball 100 feet. X

First we started on our base which would look like a rectangle with a piece of wood going in the middle like this: [|]. So, using a power drill, we made holes to where we would put our screws in. Once that was done, we went ahead and put in our screws. There was only one problem when we were putting the screws in, the wood began to split open! Obviously, the screw was way too thick for the wood which made us drown in misery. So we stopped using the thick screws and went scrounging around my shed to find thinner nails. After half an hour wasted in digging for random screws, we finally found a few. At that point, we just felt lucky. So we continued in screwing in the base which turned out pretty sturdy.

Now it was time to make our verticals which looked something and upside down Y. Since the blocks were rectangular, we had to cut some wood off to make it level with the board and ground to make it triangular. This only took a few minutes but during the process, I almost sawed off one of my friends finger since the wood jerked. Without doubt he got furious and started scorning me. With the cuts made, nailing the pieces in went quick and simple.

So with all the verticals put together with the base, it was time to drills some holes to fit a bar in between the verticals which would be our axis of rotation for the arm. This proved difficult. With a limit to our tools, our drills didn’t make big enough holes. So instead, we drilled multiple holes to make the circle bigger. This took the most time of all as we spend about two hours trying to make the perfect hole for the bar. It was successful, but nevertheless was painstakingly long.

It was almost 8:30 P.M. so we decided to call it a day. Next step, make the arm and sling!

.

When we were picking out wood, the wood looked even bigger than we had planned. At that moment, we realized this trebuchet was really, really going to be huge. So were bought fifty dollars worth of various wood and headed out to checkout. With three teenagers full of wood, the look was just suspicious. We received many questions from adults on what we were building. We couldn’t help but laugh a little and told them we were building a trebuchet for our project. Now it was time to go home.

Stacking the wood in my backyard, we began to cut the wood using a table saw. This was the first time I had ever used one and my friends were nervous at the whole cutting procedure. Everything went according to plan until we realized our prototype design was too complicated. The base of our trebuchet was going to be triangular but then we decided to make a square base to simplify the matter. After three hours of thinking and cutting, it was time to call it a day before the mosquitoes came out.

Next step, put the trebuchet together!

A trebuchet is a type of catapult in which it uses stored potential energy in its counterweight to transfer it into kinetic energy. Think of it as a seesaw in which if there was a big, fat kid on one end and a small, skinny kid on the other, the small kid would go flying. Our goal is to make this machine to launch a softball 100 feet far and hit a target. The question now is, can we do it?

Day one.

So far we have planned our model and created a prototype made of pop sickle sticks. We intend on using a scale factor and converting it into a bigger size. It took us five long hours, 1 hour in which we fiddled around with design, just to make the prototype. At first, the prototype looked unpromising as it was light and unbalanced. However, when everything was put into place, our pop sickle trebuchet looked amazing. Now all we had to do is test it.

At first we used string and a paper pouch to hold our projectile, or object. Then we put about two pounds worth of quarters into the counterweight. Now load the trebuchet, and FIRE!

Failure. Absolute failure. Instead of going forward, our projectile went backwards! All hope seemed demolished, but we gave it a second shot.

Three, two, one, and launch! Success! Our projectile went forward for about five feet! The room filled with roars of accomplishment. It had actually worked. We had actually made a trebuchet that functioned. The feeling was unimaginably pleasing.

Now with our basics down, the hardest part of actually making the real trebuchet was at hand.

By the way, after my group finishes the project, we’ll post a video of our catapult in action. If you have any questions on how this trebuchet works and ect. leave a comment and I’ll get back to you.

My first test was on Friday, May 9, which was AP United States History. Then on May 12, I took the Physics B Exam, May 13 the Chemistry Exam, and finally on May 14, the English Language Exam. Before I took the test, I reflected back on how well my teachers have taught the materials.

Most of my teachers prepared the students for the AP testing and was a primary goal in the course, but, even with all the material covered, sometimes things go wrong in the testing room. Once in the proctor began instructing students when to start the exam, the only aura that seeped into my mind was anxiety. Pretty soon, many concepts and strategies that my teachers have instructed went into thin air. The room went silent of all talk except the hurried pen or pencil writing of other students taking their test. This effect alone left me blank and sidetracked from the test that would determine my possible college credit.

Once testing was all over, it’s usually to receive some sort of relief and be in a stress-free state. However, that was not the case for me. Even with the test finished, there was no going back. The only feeling left was apprehension about what my scores would be. Pressure, doubt, and the constant questions from students of “how well do you think you did” annoyed me. Pretty soon, I began to become filled with more negative energy with each day that passed, worrying whether or not I would pass. This feeling has gotten strong and increases everyday.

Is this normal behavior or is this a sign of a bad omen?