Week 5: The Catcher in the Rye

So I'm in the middle of chapter 10. Last time I left off at the part where Holden finds out that Stradlater went on a date with a girl he knew. I'm wondering if Holden was really jealous, actually I have a feeling he was. Otherwise, why would he have gotten so mad about it? Anyway, him and Stradlater get into a fist fight and Holden ends up losing and getting a bloody nose. I don't understand why Holden pushes his luck so much. He doesn't seem like that big of a guy and he knew how mad he was making Stradlater, so why keep pushing it? He knew he wasn't going to win in a fight. It's like, "Hey! Look at this sleeping bear, I'm going to throw rocks at it until it wakes up and kills me." C'mon, who would do that?

He uses the words "bastard" and "moron" a lot. After using it so much, wouldn't you want to try and insult a person a different way?

The other thing that I don't understand is why does he consider Stradlater and Ackley his friends if he talks crap about them the whole time. I don't think I have one friend who I talk about like that and still consider them my friend. I understand that he's mad about the whole date thing with Stradlater, but if he was his friend, you'd think he'd kinda brush it off instead of pushing it so far. And Ackley, I understand he's gross and everything but if I had a "friend" that was as gross as Holden describes him, I'd probably lock him in a bathroom and tell him he couldn't come out until he was up to par with his hygiene.

One more thing that I don't understand is, why does Holden go into Ackley's room and just lie there thinking to himself? Why couldn't he have done that in his room? Why go and bother Ackley.

Also, why does he go on and on AND ON about his little sister? I feel like she is the only person that he really TRUELY cares about.  

 

I’ve found I have a horrible time with not only finding time to read, but also staying focused on reading.  Once I finally find time, whether it is in study hall, or sitting in bed, my mind seems to wander off.  If I’m in study hall, the things Holden says will make my mind wander then it’s hard to get back on track.  If I’m sitting in bed, I get distracted by my thoughts, or I get tired and end up falling asleep.  Reading for me is not very entertaining.  No matter what I’m reading, I tend to get distracted or uninterested.  Although I do like this book, it is still difficult for me to stay focused on the book and what is going on in the book compared to what is going on in my head or in the world/ room I’m sitting in.

Week 5- 1984

I have not been finding as much time is I should be to find time to read. I just have so much stuff going on in my life right now. I have school then I have work and by the time I get home I just want to either watch TV or go to bed right away. This book has been a little more interesting than my last book. It has picked up way more already than in the last book I read. I don't really have a blog for this week because i just didn't have enough time for reading this past week and weekend. Next week will be better!

Week 5: The Grapes of Rath

     I am still reading the Grapes of Rath, and I honestly didn't get a chance to read a lot this week. I am having trouble finding time to read. I am reading an independent novel for British Literature too, so I am trying to balance the two. I have found that after I get done with homework is the worst time to read. I get so frustrated and tired that I don't want to read. The best times for me to read are weekends, so I am trying to get both independent novels on the weekends.
     Anyway, back to the story. The Joads are now in a government camp, and they are looking for jobs. Tom instantly gets one right after he looks, but it only lasts a couple weeks. The other boys haven't found anything.
     Meanwhile, the camp is planning a dance. They have a dance once a week. However, they heard that some people were going to start a fight so the police could make them close down the camp. They had all of these men standing around on the lookout for someone starting a fight. Sure enough, only 2 dances in, a couple guys try to start a fight. However, they are quickly escorted off the premises.
     Now these dances always cause a big commotion because some of the people in this camp think dancing is unholy. These people aren't doing anything wrong; they are square dancing for heavens sake. Those people would have a heart attack if they came to one of our school dances.
     After the whole dance affair settles down, the Joads start looking for work again with no luck. They decide regretfully that they will have to leave the camp to go find work because they are running out of food.
This is when we finally meet the girl Al is always running off with. She is this sweet, though nieve blonde. She gets all mad because he says he is leaving, but he reassures her he is coming back and will marry her then. However, though I love Al and he is my favorite character, I highly doubt that even if they do come back, that he will marry her. I mean Al is said to always be "tomcatting" around. Well if you know anything about tom cats, they aren't exactly the "settle down, have 12 kids and live happily ever after" type. Al will more than likely soon move on to another girl.
     I did find it interesting that Steinbeck chose to put this part in the book. He generally doesn't talk too much about Al. His family will make comments about him going out, or Steinbeck will state that Al leaves to go find girls, but it never really gives you any specifics about who the girls are, or what they talk about or anything. I think this part may have been in the play to show how much comfort the Joads are giving up by leaving this camp.
      Speaking of Steinbeck, I'm starting to feel like Morgan feels while reading. While the description is nice, sometimes I just want to yell, "Okay we get the point! The ground was dry, the wind blew it away, now get on with the story!" That is basically a one line summary of something Steinbeck takes three pages to say. I have come to the conclusion that I am just going to start skimming the parts that get like that and really just focus on the story.

Week 5: The Hobbit

Since I missed last week I have a lot more reading to blog about this week. Though I feel like it taking me more time to read though this book then it usually takes me to read though a book of this size. I think what is slowing me down on this book compared to other books that I have read is that this book has so many songs in it and since it has so many songs I like to read through these as though the characters are actually singing the song. Some of the songs are shorter but most of the songs are at least a page and a half long. Besides the songs there are spots where they are explaining where they are or where they are going to and so I stop and look at the map in the beginning of the book to try and figure out the path they are traveling and how the characters are seeing it.

I don’t remember where I last left off but as of right now the characters are traveling through the mountains which are said to be very dangerous. When they stop to rest in a cave they are captured by goblins that live in the mountain. As they are being carried away Bilbo falls down deeper into the goblins cave. There he is knocked out but when he comes around again he finds a golden ring. Seeing no way out he starts to look around for an exit. Suddenly he finds a huge lake. This is where he meets Gollum and they make a deal. If Bilbo wins at the game Gollum wants to play then he will show Bilbo the way out, but if he loses Gollum will eat him. Eventually Bilbo escapes and meets up with the rest of the group who have also found their way out of the goblins cave. But soon they get into more trouble when wolves that are in cahoots with the goblins corner them when they scramble up some trees to get away from them. But Gandalf has his own plans and gets them out of trouble with some of his friends who then take them through part of their journey and also replenish some of their supplies. They start walking again but after some time they see that their food supplies have grown quit low and are in need of replenishment. Gandalf has a friend that could help them, but this friend doesn’t care much for visitors. But when they come upon his house they find that he is very interested in their story and allows them to stay and agrees to replenish their supplies and how they should go about the rest of their journey. After a few days the group is again ready to continue on the rough road.

week five, the catcher in the rye

From where I left off last week Holden and Stradlater were talking in the bathroom because Stradlater is getting ready for a date. While they are talking Stradlater asks Holden to write an English composition for him, because his date doesn't give him time to do it. When Holden asks who his date is he realizes that it is the same girl he has strong feelings for, her name is Jane. Holden isn't very pleased that Stradlater is taking Jane on a date. Before Stradlater left to go on the date he borrowed Holden's hounds-tooth jacket. All Holden can think about when Stradlater leaves are Jane and Stradlater going on this date. I think that if Stradlater and Holden are good friends Stradlater should know that Holden likes this girl and he shouldn't be taking her on a date for that reason. But since Holden didn't say anything about it Stradlater went off anyway.

After supper Holden got into a snowball fight with some other Pencey boys. Then Holden and a friend decide to go into town to see a movie, even though Holden hates movies. He went with Mal and Ackley. When they get there Mal and Ackley inform Holden that they have already seen the film, so instead the boys play some pinball and head back to Pencey. When they get back Mal goes off to do his own thing and Ackley is being bothersome like always to Holden. In order to get Ackley to leave Holden began working on the English assignment for Stradlater. I don't think Holden should do Stradlater's assignment for him. Holden barely even does his own work. I think if Stradlater wants to be successful that he should do his work by himself. Holden could be trying to get his grades up instead of doing Stradlater's work but he chooses to do it for him anyway.

Stradlater told Holden that the paper was supposed to be a simple description of a house or a room or something similar. But Holden couldn't think of anything to say about a house or a room so he wrote about a baseball glove that his brother, Allie, used to use to copy poems onto with green ink. Several years before Allie died of leukemia. He was two years younger than Holden; he says Allie was the most intelligent member of his family. I’m glad that Holden thinks that about his brother. He must have thought the world of him. I would ever lose one of my brothers I’m not sure what I would do. Holden said that the night his brother passed away he slept in the garage and broke all of the windows with his bare hands.

This book so far is good but I sort of have mixed feelings about the Holden because of some of his behaviors in school. I feel like he would do something for someone else to get a good grade but his don’t matter to him. If I was him I would try harder for myself instead of others.

Week 5 The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter

Leaving off from last week it seems that finally at least something....different has happened. It seems like most of this book has been just random accounts of normal bits of these characters lives. Nothing too exciting has happened so far and I wonder why John Singer's parts int he book aren't much bigger when he seems to be the main character. I wish that this book was moving faster, it's not as bad as it could be but more than halfway through the book I still have no idea what the plot is supposed to be other than just simple stories of the people in this town.

Anyway, in what I most recently read something that may be important later has happened (Or is it just something to fill up space? I can't tell yet.) Mick's brother, George was outside playing and for whatever reason the kids he was playing with had a gun....I don't know why no adults were watching over them or why they were even allowed to have the gun, especially when it was loaded. George was playing around when he saw a girl from across the street, it seems like he had a crush on her and was trying to get her attention. George forgets that the gun is loaded and pulls the trigger, shooting the girl in the head. Thankfully somehow she survives and only has a fractured skull. However her mother is extremely angry and overprotective of her child and quickly insists that the Kelly family pays for everything to do with the hospital fees, or anything else that the girl will need. George runs away shortly afterwards, feeling guilty but the family eventually finds him wandering the highway.That section ends there, leaving the reader unaware of what happens next and I don't know yet if the book will give more answers.

Now the book continues to Dr. Copeland, Portia's father. I'm not sure why but he is holding some sort of party, inviting only certain people and I think he is giving gifts to them? This part of the book wasn't very clear and I don't understand the point of it either. When all the people have arrived Dr. Copeland suddenly wants everyone's attention and he starts talking to everyone. He tells some sort of religious story that I didn't understand. It also seems like he is very passionate about this story, telling it twice in a row.

I think the hardest thing about this blog is trying to find time to read, between work and school whenever I do have free time I am way too tired to even try concentrate on this book, especially when it isn't exactly something I would choose to read for fun and still doesn't have much going on. I wish we could blog about books we want to read...and the term modern literature wasn't so misleading! I think for my next book I will have to choose something that is more exciting, and maybe I can actually start blogging about what happens instead of another post about how nothing is going on in my book.

Week 5

1984 by George Orwell     

            This week when I was reading I found out that his dream change to a woman.   A woman with black hair that took off her clothes and jumped at him. But he didn’t do anything but when he woke up he had the word Shakespeare on his lips. I find that weird. Do they not know about Shakespeare? In the reading it’s talking about it like it was in ancient time or something.

                When he woke up he sat up naked and then the alarm saying work out time. But later on it says that they only get three thousand cloths coupons annually. So he doesn’t buy pajamas. Why do they get so little for cloths when you need them?  Why don’t they put them there self they have jobs? This part was really strange to me.

                The Physical Jerks started up. That’s what their work out was called. The next minute a woman appears on his TV and started their work out.  I don’t understand why they must work out all the time?  When she started she said thirty to forty groups. I believe that they broke the people in to groups to they have the same working. But well they were working out the women made a comment about a war that all the young people are over in. What war could they be fighting in the sound like a peaceful place? My guess is that there are people that are rebelling.

            It’s really hard to find time to read. I go to school like everyone else. I don’t have internet at my house to type this up and blog it. I have a job that I work about 25 hours a week at. I work right after school at 2 and don’t get off until about 9. Finding time and a computer with internet to blog is difficult to do. But I hope this next coming week I will be able to read more than this week.