BLOG REFLECTION

To be honest, blogging is not a new thing to me when I was first introduced to start a blog in this class. I have made a blog for myself few years ago. The reason why I made it is because many of my friends have one and I wish I could be part of their group and to have something in common to talk about. However, I was not that enthusiatic after I finished creating mine few years back. I took it lightly by posting some meaningless comments or passages on it and two weeks later, i quitted. I did not encounter with blogging since then.

Therefore, when I was told in this class to have a blog created for ourselves, I was like "oh not again!". I thought it would be a boring task all over again to blog and this time it will be worse still as I am forbidden to quit from blogging. As things progress, I am surprise it did not turn out as boring as I thought it would be. Instead, I feel satisfied whenever I finish posting my own opinions about our homeworks or reflection on my blog. It is encouraging to have my classmates to view my blog, it just kind of boast my enthusiasm to get involved more in my own blog.

Speaking of blogging about our homeworks or assignments, I remembered how effective it was to actually summarize my primary source on my blog. I could imagine where I would end up being if I did not do so. Normally, when I were to do my assignment, I do not summarize my sources or stuff like that. I would rather read through my sources for several times and that is it. However, this time was different. Due to the fact that I have a blog and I need to do something about it, the task of summarizing my primary source did not seem as mysterious as before. I took it as a homework to do online and went on to complete the summary. To my surprise, after summarizing my primary source, I gained my knowledge and information that I did not notice at first about my primary source. I was more familiar with my primary source then and it did not cause any problems to me to actually write more about my primary source furthur in my Primary Source Analysis paper.

As things came to secondary sources, I remembered we all have to describe our secondary sources found to used in our following paper. The interesting part in this pratice is that my classmates and I have to post some useful and constructive comments on others' post to give them some ideas to further expand their topic or to suggest ways to use their sources effectively. Actually, this is the time I truly appreciate the benefits of blogging. This is because in this case, my blog has turned into a platform where I could share my ideas with all my classamates and I got positive responses and meaningful ideas from them in return. This virtual discussion room has allowed me to continue working on my secondary sources without getting stuck in some of the questions like how am I supposed to expand my secoundary sources so that they are supportive to my previous sources and things like that. I really enjoy to have my posts on my blog to be viewed by others or to view others' blog posts too. It provides me a lot more information than I could get on my own.

Before this, I never realised that blogging could be this fun and helpful. I am very glad to now have my blog reactivated during my class time. I think I will continue blogging even after this quarter. I decide to treat this stuff seriously and now my main concern is about how to decorate my blog with fancy stuffs. I want my viewers to take it as a way of entertaining themselves when they are viewing my blog. I have learned a lot in this class but what I appreciate the most is actually this blogging part.

I think the video posted above could help me a little bit on how to decorate my blog.I will go on and view it so, Bye!

Commonplace Narrative Essay

Speaking of Commonplace essay, I decided to write about the exercise of stair climbing. This is an interesting topic to me because I think ever since lift or elevator services have been provided almost everywhere, less and less people prefer walking up the stair to upper levels. I also find that people always undermine the benefits stair climbing brings to us. It is actually an exercise. As more and more people complaining that they do not have enough time to exercise, they on the other hand, are wasting opportunities everyday to get their body healthy by climbing stairs. Despite for the sake of health, I would also want to write about this topic to recall back some of my childhood memories. When I was young, I used to stair climbed with my siblings and we always competed with each other to be the first one to reach the top. It was a fun and precious memory my brothers and I shared. Not only that, I can still remember clearly all the old places I have been to when I was young because of the stairs that I have climbed there. In other word, stair climbing is an activity that is important in my life. As people are getting too dependent on elevators, we refuse to use the stairs even if we are going to one or two floors above from where we are. Eventually, people start thinking that stairs are merely a second preferable way to reach upper floors other than taking the elevators. Therefore, I decided to spread the information of the benefits of stair climbing to people so that people will start appreciating the exercise of stair climbing.

Brief description of my Secondary Source

The lyrics to the song perfomed by Adele," Set Fire to the Rain" is the subject I work on for my primary source analysis.

My secondary source are as follow:
1)journal of popular music studies
2)article of "Lets Analyse the Lyrics to Adele's"Set Fire to the Rain"
3)article from Music Week of title"US Charts: Adele's 21 surpasses 6 million Stateside sales

Therefore with my secondary sources, I can expand my analaysis by examning the reason what role the lyrics of this song has played in making Adele's style of singing and her success. In my secondary sources, there stated some concepts talking about how people's attention are not their own but as a conformity to the society's interest and so on. This point is expected to be my main point in my secondary analysis and from there I will further provide examples to elaborate my points.

       Evidences are used to support claims. A claim will never seem convincing without the addition of concrete data, facts that are kwown as evidence. Therefore, with a claim, there comes evidence. It is very important to recognize their relationship to each other in order to come out with a solid claim. Often time, people do not provide evidence that are from reliable sources and that directly causes the claim to be not solid. People do not just take in what they have been told, instead, they tend to oppose whatever they are dealing with until they can convince themselves with evidence that are in favor of the claim. Therefore, after recognizing the importance of this relationship, I would be specially careful in providing evidence for my claim. Not only that, I would further advance my claim with evidence found from my secondary source with clear explanation. I believe if I can stick with this concept, it would help me alot in completing my secondary sources analysis.

The meaning of the lyrics of the song "set fire to the rain"

I let it fall, my heart
And as it fell, you rose to claim it
It was dark and I was over
Until you kissed my lips and you saved me
My hands, they were strong, but my knees were far too weak
To stand in your arms without falling to your feet

But there's a side to you that I never knew, never knew
All the things you'd say, they were never true, never true
And the games you'd play, you would always win, always win

But I set fire to the rain
Watched it pour as I touched your face
Well, it burned while I cried
'Cause I heard it screaming out your name, your name

When laying with you I could stay there
Close my eyes, feel you here forever
You and me together, nothing is better

'Cause there's a side to you that I never knew, never knew
All the things you'd say, they were never true, never true
And the games you's play, you would always win, always win

But I set fire to the rain
Watched it pour as I touched your face
Well, it burned while I cried
'Cause I heard it screaming out your name, your name
I set fire to the rain
And I threw us into the flames
When we fell, something died
'Cause I knew that that was the last time, the last time

Sometimes I wake up by the door
That heart you caught must be waiting for you
Even now when we're already over
I can't help myself from looking for you

I set fire to the rain
Watched it pour as I touch your face
Well, it burned while I cried
'Cause I heard it screaming out your name, your name
I set fire to the rain
And I threw us into the flames
When we fell, something died
'Cause I knew that that was the last time, the last time, oh
Oh, no
Let it burn, oh
Let it burn
Let it burn

Read more at http://www.songmeanings.net/songs/view/3530822107858857797/#y6hbZ0lYIj4MvALe.99

SUMMARY

This song is mainly about an awful relationship between a couple of lovers. A girl falls for a guy real quick and she is naive to think that she is the special one for the guy. However, it turns out that the guy is not serious in that relationship and the girl finds it so hard to pull herself off from him even though she knows the truth. After having her hard time try to fight back as the guy continues to play around with her, she never managed to win. She still loves him as ever but  she has to force herself to admit that she will never truly have him by her side. Therefore, she finally decides to call off the relationship although it is a painful decision to be made.