Meeting Leif

Today was my first real meeting with Leif Masrud and I like him even more then I did originally and I already had a lot of respect for him because of how much he had helped Nate. In fact if he hadn't helped Nate in the past I don't think I would have even considered having a tutor at all. Its fascinating to think of this because if it weren't for Nate I wouldn't be getting the education that I want. I will have to thank Nate but even more important is that Leif is willing to help me with my downfalls in my Math work including Long division and Fractions which after today I have a lot more confidence doing. The coolest part is that Leif is not under the impression that all parts of math are going to be usefull in the future for example long division is rarely going to be too useful unless I'm dividing prices in the grocery store or something along those lines.

My project is coming along nicely but instead of waring on about it every day I'm going to give an update once a week and let you see the slow progression on how things are doing. The interesting thing is that probably at this rate that I will be done with the whole planning thing in a couple weeks at most. Of course thats if I keep up this pace so it probably won't be that short either with my luck. The most important part is that I don't rush to meet with some kind of deadline because once I start thinking that I need to be done by a certain point I will rush and screw things up.

Recently around the house things are getting pretty bad outside of my home school career. My little sister Zoe is going through some growing pains but the main reason why I'm so concerned about all of it is that I am going to be the person that will be babysitting her while she works on some of her problems. In other wotds I'm getting paid through all of this and it certainly helps me with whats going on with Cindy who was providing me with a steady paycheck despite it being somewhat small. I have an effect on things that are going on right now and I hope that things don't get any worse because some of the tension that's building up is almost thick enough for you to cut with a knife. Of course it will slowly start dyeing out for everyone else so this won't be that bad for long as long as no one does anything stupid.

Getting started right

I am seriously enjoying my new project but to let things straightened out from my last blog entry which was sadly on Monday. Instead of just explaining on how to mod a gun to an audience I am going to build my own Nerf gun instead and honestly I love it. Here is the start I have gotten on the whole thing so far. You'll need to zoom in on the picture because its a large paper that has taken over a large chunk of the wall next to my computer. The most interesting part is that I am trying to keep the aspect from the original idea and still try to teach someone on how to build this Nerf gun but who knows what might happen in the long run and maybe then I can set up a Nerf community in the area and we can start getting some Nerf wars organized. I hope to contact Freeskool soon after I get all of my thoughts sorted out. I don't know much on the whole teaching part yet but I can definitely build this gun if I can put my mind to all of this and stay focused.

The coolest part is that you might notice in the picture above that there are prices on certain items. The reason for this is to start building myself a budget and then propose the amount of money that I will need to spend to the parents. I am nowhere near ready to start presenting any of the budget yet because I still don't know what I'm going to build the nerf gun out of or what will the material cost and how much will I need. In other words I'm trying very hard to get all of the details in that I need before proposing anything to the parents. I'm having one heck of a time with this project and I am seriously enjoying a lot and for every second I think about it the more it works out in my head and can only hope now that I don't make this any harder for me then it needs to be.

This entire project comes down into just details. For example the very large cluster to the left is all about what kind of dart I want to use and the reasons why I should use it instead of the others. The only kind of ammo I vetoed is the disk type and thats because of how obnoxious it would be to use it and how to make a way to load them into the Nerf gun. The rest of it was up to the challenge and there are at least 4 different types of darts and not including duplicates of that kind of dart for a different reasons. For example the Whistler darts also have different type very similar which is used for the official Nerf dart tag tournaments. The streamline dart comes in two different varieties but I included this one because its important to know that the streamline elite dart is more expensive but also has more range and is more sturdy. Its the small details that make this all so hard and that means that I haven't started on some of the larger stuff yet but thats also why this is allowed to last an entire semester so I'm not worried about getting this done very fast.

Restaurant Review: Em Chemas

I have had a fantastic weekend so far but to start it all off I have had one fantastic meal over at a place called Em Chemas which is a Brazilian grill. I absolutely loved the food there and unlike my last review which was Cheddars the tone is very consistent. One of the problems is that yet again this place has a kinda bad location which doesn't help it but it doesn't exactly hinder it as much as most because of the price of things over there aren't exactly cheap but I can't say that you won't leave satisfied with a fantastic meal.

On the inside of the store and a little bit more specific they serve at least 12 different meats there and trust me on this that it is plenty to keep you going. Originally I thought that I would be ordering from a menu but instead the people come around with this meat on some huge skewers and each one is perfect for their own reasons but there is one that I agree is the best and the whole family agrees that never pass up the ham because it is the best that any of us have tasted to date. The atmosphere is calm and kinda fancy which makes recommended that you get dressed up for going over here but once again it is all worth it. Finally location as I mentioned earlier isn't that big of a problem because first off this is the kind of place you don't go to weekly but instead once every couple months or on special occasions but the building itself is behind some other places but shouldn't be that bad considering how many other people have to go into that area. Either way I believe that this place is worth going to at least once and if you don't like the atmosphere just talk to someone about ordering one of those fantastic hams because they do sell them to people.

Today I have also been working very hard on an idea for a project and then I remembered that I used to have a very fun hobby that I don't exactly partake in anymore. I used to mod Nerf guns for fun and honestly I had a blast. The problem with this for a project is that my project has to at least last a good semester. In that case what would I be doing for an entire semester that would have to revolve around Nerf guns. What I will be doing is hopefully contacting the Freeskool group and seeing if I can teach a class on how to mod one of these guns and then turn around and have a Nerf war or 2. Either way tell me your thoughts and leave a comment on my blog, Google plus, or Facebook and then I'll see what I can do to get back to you but warning I am not taking any recommendations because I feel that this project should be my own as much as possible.

Becoming interested

Recently I have been looking into some of the things going on with the public around the world lately. For example my work on food insecurity or today's video on what happened in Japan with the nuclear meltdown a year back. The episode just came out 3 days ago so its not outdated when all your doing is looking for some information that you didn't know. The interesting part about this frontline video about the nuclear meltdown in Japan is that it shows that it is still causing damage to the environment today over there and that if it wasn't dealt with in the way it was it could've affected everyone all over the entire world and maybe it already has affected everyone.

I am still working constantly on my work which my main focus is math because of how far I have fallen behind. Because of this we are pretty much willing to cut back some of my work to put even more focus on getting me back up to a 9th grade math level instead of the 7/8th grade level that I am at right now. I do believe that with Lief's help it shouldn't be that hard but if things do start to get to the point where I will need some extra work in math then I guess there are options. Speaking of Lief I finally have a date set up to get started on my tutoring. I hope that the first day goes well and maybe just maybe things will turn out right in the end.

Despite all of the things going on recently I am still working on something else along with my work which is a huge struggle for me. My problem is that I am trying to become proactive but at the same time I seem to be rejecting the thought of changing my behavior towards things. I'm trying very hard but things have been very difficult for me. I make plans and they never get touched. i want to force myself to sit down and do this stuff that I lay out but I can't seem to accept doing so. I don't know what I'm doing wrong with all of this but the point is that I'm trying very hard to do this. It is probably the hardest thing I have done in my life to date.

Ears to the ground and eyes on the TV

 Todays work has been satisfying but todays most interesting stuff is happening outside of my life and honestly outside of my house. For example today had some wonderfully heavy rain that was absolutely perfect after the last couple of days being chalk full of hot, dry, weather that was just obnoxious. I honestly went for a long relaxing walk through the rain and came back sopping wet which is exactly what I wanted then I came home and got straight to work because while the walk was relaxing and helpful it used time that I could have been doing something like working on the research for Food insecurity which was extremely eye opening to look up.

I would go into more details on food insecurity but things are getting pretty bad with this whole government shutdown going on and even I'm fascinated to see how things will turn out. I just saw the news report on someone firing off a gun outside of the white house and how the capitol went into lock down because of it. I'm just scared to see if someone will push their luck on what they might try to do and if they do America will be in more chaos then there is right now which could end very badly for everyone. My family is suffering some of the least repercussions that any american can face at the moment so I don't know what people are going through first hand out there but I do know that people are being removed from their jobs during this government shutdown so people can't provide for their family. I know things are getting bad out there I just hope things aren't going to get worse by one bad decision from someone.

Things are getting bad but I things for me are still doing pretty good because I'm not being directly affected yet. Because of this my life goes on pretty normal at the moment but many people around the U.S. are in terror that can't be helped without this break ending. I don't stand on any side of this argument but are probably not going the way that people imagined them to go at all. Other then all of the politics going on things are just fantastic for me with David Copperfield coming along nicely and moving at a nice pace through the Watsons go to Birmingham and Ron Paul's book about today's current school economy.

Wrapping up a series

Today I finished Rachael vs Guy kids Cook off and I was honestly sad to see it end in only 4 weeks. I also understand why they had to end it like so, but I wish that it wasn't so short. I felt that the person who won deserved it but I also could see a couple of other kids being able to do just as good if not better. For example Cole was open with the audience and not afraid to be different so being able to make cooking fun would be easy for him. Thats beside the point though because I would like to know who you think should have won and if you haven't seen it you could probably find it on food network
Don't be afraid to post on Facebook or Google + either because I am paying attention.  

While I'm on the subject of something food related and in particular the kids cook off I feel inferior in comparison to some of those other cooks out there. I love food as much as the next person but despite being able to cook some fascinating meals I can honestly say that those kids are dedicated while someone like me can once again not figure out how to cook rice which only solidifies this feeling. Still I don't have an itneresting talent but there has to be something that I can do that they couldn't possibly do but I don't know the kids either so I guess for now they are better cooks and I certainly won't deny a dish of food from any of them.

Other then my jealousy of those kids I feel pretty darn good today. I'm trying to find things to do that will help me become more proactive that hasn't been done before on my blog. Like say continuing work on my raspberry Pi which fell out of my blog slowly or the catapult that also like the Pi seemed to disappear without anyone noticing. I'm not going to accept or ask for suggestions from anyone because thats not going to accomplish anything for anyone. Yes maybe someone on my blog recommends something really fantastic for me to do but I didn't go out and decide to do it on my own so it doesn't accomplish moving from reactive to proactive. In other words I'm on my own on this one except for Kristi who is going to help me make sure that I don't fall out of this idea either much like the catapult.

Loving the work

I really enjoy working at Hillcrest because of being usefull to people that actually need my help. I wish I was able to help out a little bit more but since I haven't been there for that long and despite going out of my way to find work I still can't seem to get work when it matters the most. I try to help out people that need it but I can't seem to do much half the time and have to go get someone else to answer the question. I help out with electronics and appliances but after those are done for the day I have to go hunt down some kind of work on my own. When that comes around I start feeling pretty useless until someone asks for my help. At which point I jump up and get straight to work to have something to do.

Things are going fantastically for the most part and with things finally being set up with Leif I am getting close to getting things on the right track for the beginning of the year because its not that late into the year until the snow hits. I'm off to a fantastic start this years and full speed ahead so I'm ready for the rest of the challenges the rest of the year and I hope that you can all keep up with how things go throughout the year.

 I don't have that much to talk about today other then the Thriftshop but I feel like I have to provide the audience a complete 3 paragraphs today even thought I just want to quit. I feel like I need to provide for those that are reading this even when I'm at a stalemate. It's interesting because of the fact that I even mentioned that I would try for 2 paragraphs every Tuesday but even then I don't think I really meant it because even then I sat down and made sure that I would make a third paragraph. I also apologize for grinding on about seemingly random things at times because just because I say something does not make it literature gold. I might have to rewrite a good chunk of things every once in a while because of the lack of interesting things going on in my blog most of the time but due to the fact that I am not that good at going out and doing things or being Reactive instead of Proactive I don't have many interesting things that happen unless they happen to me when they come to me.