Wellness Day

March 14th was wellness day at Alden High School. It was also the day 116 students skipped school. It seem like a cool idea, going to workshops throughout the day, and it was pretty fun. I feel like there was a lot of miscommunication with the students who were supposed to be present for the workshops. For starters, I never received an email with my schedule. When I found out where I needed to go, I was told I was not supposed to be there and was sent to the office only to be sent back to the workshop. I also thought the workshops were cut short, we should have had more time in each one. Other than these things, Wellness Day was really fun. I like picking which workshops I went to, however I would have loved to go to how to train a therapy dog.

Astronaut Tests

During the 50's, NASA wanted to find the best men to become Mercury astronauts. There were 508 military candidates and to weed out the best seven, they tested them in 145-decibel rooms, secluded them in isolation chambers, and were exposed to extreme heat and cold. I took one of the numerous test given to the candidates, and I completely failed. If I were subjected to those conditions, I wouldn't have any chance of become an astronaut. Although they may seem extreme and unethical, those are things that should be tested for and experienced because anything can happen in space. It is important to be prepared for the worst. Additionally, it is important to have assurance that the chosen few can stand the test of the job.

CS4HS

For the showcase, it would be cool to program a robot to retrieve drinks from a fridge or snacks from a cupboard. To make the robot easier to program, the user will posses a remote with the items the robot can retrieve. These items will have colored dots on them so the robot will be able to identify what the user requests. When  a button is pressed, it will inform the robot which color should be looked for.

Programming for this robot should include travel (from the user to the fridge/cupboard) and a processing method to determine which item to grab. Additionally, a remote will need to be programmed, and a way for the robot to pick things up will need to be designed. 

Kindness Week

In honor of kindness week, our college computer apps class wrote thank you cards to people who have left a positive impact on our lives. I chose to write a card to a science teacher I have had multiple times in my high school career. He is a man who has helped me realize my passions, and has pushed me to be my very best in my academic career.

I thought writing the card would be extremely awkward, but once my pen hit the paper, I did not stop writing until the letters became too small to read. I feel like I could have written more, and I feel like I should have done more to thank him. At least he has a small sense of my gratitude, and the gratitude that other students have for him.

Sand Along the Sunshine State

When I was younger, about nine-years-old, my family took a trip to St. George Island. The island is located off the Florida Panhandle in the northern gulf of Mexico. To get to it, we had to travel across a bridge which stretched for miles and scared me to the bone. It was so narrow, and it seemed we could easily drive over the guardrail, sending us plummeting into the salty water with sharks and other sea creatures that might want to eat us. Once on the island, I never wanted to leave because that would mean I would have to cross the panic attack inducing, and seemingly endless, bridge.

Secretly, I hoped the bridge would collapse so we would never have to cross it again, but that wasn't the only reason I wanted that bridge destroyed. I loved the island. We rented a house which stood proud against the gulf breeze. At night, my cousin and I would crawl through a window to reach the highest peak on the roof and suck in the cool, salty air while peering at the brilliant night sky filled with a million twinkling stars.

My favorite part of the trip was the walks along the beach with my family members.  Aunt Nay and I would jog the stretches of white sand at the crack of dawn. Later in the day, Grandma would take me for lazy strolls along the shoreline and help me collect pretty shells as well as miscellaneous objects I found interesting. This was a daily routine, and I crave the baloney sandwiches and off brand chip lunches my grandma made for me as I type.

One day we decided to walk the along the beach as a family. Grandma and Grandpa; Uncle Dave and Aunt Lori and Haley and Jessica; Aunt Nay and Uncle Don; Uncle Ronny, my mom, and I walked in a giant pack. My cousin and I were leading the pack. We were far out in front, trotting along the wet sand with waves gently rolling over top of our feet, until was found a circular white thing laying in the sand. 

We stopped dead in our tracks. It was the most beautiful thing we had seen on the island. The pack caught up, and my Aunt Nay explained to us it was a sand dollar. We picked it up and continued on our way.

A little further down the beach, we saw more sand dollars, and even some star fish. My Aunt explained to us that there was probably a sand bar just off the shore. We took a break since Grandma and Grandpa were beginning to tire, and our aunt led us to the sand bar. It was the coolest thing I had ever seen in my life. On the sand bar, at least fifty yards from the shore, the gulf came to my waist after swimming in water that was way over my head. Under the surface were dozens of sand dollars along with shells and star fish. I gaped while under water and saltiness fill my mouth.

I have a sand dollar from that sand bar, though it is illegal to take wildlife off the island. That inconspicuous clue which lead us the the coolest thing I have ever seen in my life now lays in a drawer in my desk, along with some old receipts and sticky tack, only unburied when the occasional feeling of the Florida sun flickers across my mind.

Day Dreams

Everyone wishes they could have a super power at least once during their lifetime. Some may choose to fantasize about lifting a bus with super strength, or running at the speed of light, or commanding the TV remote to fly into their hand so they don't have to get up from their comfy position. I have dreamed of a power vastly different from the ones previously explained. My amazing super power would be the ability to control the weather.

With this power, I could be a human weapon blasting the enemy with deadly hurricanes or subzero temperatures. However, I would probably do the opposite and protect people from  devastating weather phenomenon. I could also create the perfect warm, sunny day for a picnic or superb conditions for a trip to the ski resort.

What I do know for sure is that I would end the dreary, raining winters we have been experiencing in the Buffalo NY area, and replace them with light, snowy days. Those kind of days where you feeling like you're living in a snow globe with plump, lazy snowflakes falling from the sky; the kind of days that feel--magical. Once a few feet of snow has accumulated, the sun would burst through the clouds, shining it's sunny rays on the fluffy powder. Of course there would have to be a blizzard once in a while so we could get out of work, school, and undesirable social obligations.

I leave you with this thought: What super power would you chose, and what would you decide to do with it?

3D Printing in 2015

Spencer Lowell published an article called "3-D Printing Emerges From A Plastic Soup" in an August 2015 edition of Wired on page 32. The main idea is exactly as the title suggests and mentions, at the time, a new process of 3-D printing called Carbon3D. Instead of creating an object from the bottom up using plastic filament layers, a Carbon3D printer uses a 30-year-old technology called stereolithography. Stereolithography essentially utilizes a resign that hardens when exposed to UV light, which creates the object from the top to the bottom.

A Carbon3D printer focuses the UV light with a projector and can print up to 100 times faster than their makerbot counter-parts, according to the article. I found it interesting how someone came across this old process and applied it to new technology. It's also cool how chemistry is proving to be important to our futures. Makes me feel a bit better about my career choice. I'm sure my fellow chemmies feel the same.

I would like to know why I have never heard of this technology. If it is so much more efficient, why aren't more people and companies using it? I would also like to know more about the process such as what the resign is composed of. I would assume some kind of carbon hence the name Carbon3D. On the topic of 3D printing, researching the different 3D printing processes would be pretty interesting.

In my opinion, I believe this article would be slightly different if it were written today. I think it would be much more in depth because 3D printing has become more popular and people are more familiar with it.

A Little Bit About Me...

Fresh powder, chilly mountain air, and a freshly tuned board are a few of my favorite things. As you could possibly guess, most of my time is spent at a ski resort selling soft and hard goods at a small ski shop. For me, there is a lot more to do in the winter than there is the summer. Snowboarding is my place, my lifestyle, and I intend to live it out my entire life. Once graduation comes, I plan on attending Clarkson University to study chemical engineering.