AOW 2-26-15

Boko Haram + ISIS = Marrage from Hell., CNN News




The Boko Haram is a terrorist group in west Africa, and people who have been observing their recent actions say that they have seemed to eerily mimic ISIS. The way they have beheaded and stoned people, and made use of social media in much the same way as ISIS has, has began to spark worries that they may form an alliance.

"The latest sign that Boko Haram is wooing ISIS came on Sunday with a series of tweets released by jihadist site Afriqiyah Media, which declared its own allegiance to ISIS in December. One tweet quoted Boko Haram's own media arm as saying: "We give you glad tidings that the group's Shurah Council is at the stage of consulting and studying, and we will let you know soon the group's decision in respect to pledging allegiance to the Caliph of the Muslims Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, may Allah preserve him," according to a translation by SITE Intelligence."


This is of course very worrying, however it is somewhat questionable on the Haram's part due to smaller factions within the terror group. The way Boko Haram is imitating ISIS, to the high quality videos and pictures to even the similare camera angles these are taken at, to useing twitter. They have also been seen with the ISIS flag, which alone is quite worrying. Though a formal pledge of alliegence has yet to happen, it seems possible. However, ISIS has not seemed as solid on reciprocating, possibly because Boko Haram is so separated from its self and has small sections that may not all agree with an alliance.

This is a problem that needs to be watched, because with two terrorist groups forming together, things will get even worse than they already are. Also, with larger groups they may also be able to spread to other countries and start problems in farther places, which is why we need to keep up on this and be prepared.

AOW Impressions 2/2/15

This week I noticed that a lot of people chose articles that had very over-arching topics, while some had more specific ones. Global warming was the most obvious to me since several people I saw chose it. Issues like the sea levels rising, how 2014 was the hottest year so far over all, and how all of this climate change is being caused by greenhouse gasses. There were also however more specific topics, like Jesus's article about the portraits Holocaust victims did of eachother so they wouldn't be erased if/when they died, and Gabe's article on how Yemen is having a water crisis, and the crops they use most of it on has very little world trade value; causing a sort of financial crisis.

It was rather fun to do, but also a bit stressful not only when your presenting but also when your going around to people. When you present it's hard to give people enough information fast enough because you don't want to keep them, but then another person comes in the middle of your explanation and you have to catch them up on what your talking about. As for when your walking around I got the feeling that there was never enough time to really get an understanding of the persons or what it was about. I don't think it was really the person's fault either. I'm really not sure how this could be fixed, but if the rushed feeling could lessen it'd be a lot less stressful.

The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time 2-19-15, pages 1-26

I really like the way Christopher speaks. He explains everything, like why certain things mean what to him and why he doesn't like metaphors because as a picture they don't look the same as what they mean. "And when I try to make a picture of the phrase in my head it just confuses me because imagining an apple in someone's eye doesn't have anything to do with liking someone a lot and it makes you forget what the person was talking about." However, he does like similes, because they, unlike metaphors, do look like what they mean, so that it's a thing you can picture. "this is not a metaphor, it is a simile, which means that it really did look like there were two very small mice hiding in his nostrils, and if you make a picture in your head of a man with two very smal mice hiding in his nostrils, you will know what the police inspector looked like. And a simile is not a lie, unless it is a bad simile." The way he thinks and the way he understands things just makes perfect sense. I also like the way there are pictures of what he's explaining, and he compares things a lot when he talks, which is something I do as well. Sort of a ramble, in a way that gets somewhat away from the point while still explaining said point at the same time. He also writes in long sentences, which is a thing that I also do. I find it very easy to read so far probably just because of that actually.

As part of the reader I like how you get a pretty solid sense of Christopher as a character really early. It doesn't take that long for him to have a definite personality, and as someone who also writes I'm kind of surprised because normally it takes a little longer for characters to fully form as a person in a story. It's just kinda cool.

Anyway Christopher findes that his neighbor's neighbor's dog has been murdered. The next day is a good day, so he decides that he's going to solve the murder.

Book Talk: A Discovery of Witches

"A Discovery of Witches" by Deborah Harkness is a fantasy novel set in current day England, France, and New York State. It begins in Oxford, where a scholar named Diana Bishop finds a lost manuscript called Ashmole 782 during her study of historical alchemy in The Bodleian library. Diana Bishop comes from two ancient lines of witches, and finds immediately that the manuscript is enchanted. Wanting nothing to do with magic she quickly takes some notes on Ashmole 782 and sends it back, not knowing that it's been lost for hundreds of years and contains information on the origins of all the creatures; Human, Vampire, Witch, and Daemon.
Diana Bishop is a historian, and though she is also a witch, she wants absolutely nothing to do with magic. When her aunt Sarah tried to teach her spells they would never work, and some things her mother did with magic frightened her when she was a child. Since human fear often leads to trouble for other creatures, witches daemons and vampires are meant to avoid one another. When together, they'll get noticed, and getting noticed never bodes well. Diana's parents were studying abroad in Africa when she was seven, and were murdered. The things other witches said at their funeral about how they had attracted too much attention made her turn away from magic entirely; seeing it as the reason for their death. By the age of 20 she had graduated collage. When she got a doctorate in history she had separated her self entirely from her family line of magic and passed as an ordinary human in everything but genes.
Shortly after her encounter with Ashmole 782 other creatures sense that it was found, and come to the library. One of them is the vampire Mathew DeClarmont, who specializes in genetics. He invites her to dinner, saying that he's interested in her work, and she tuns him down saying that she has plans.  They don't get along right away, but after this he begins to sit in the same room as her  at the Bodleian, and the other creatures avoid them.

Throughout the events of the story, Diana is forced to bring magic back into her life, and learns far more about herself than would have otherwise. Mathew assumes the role of a sort of gaurdian soon after his appearance as people who are trying to find Ashmole 782 begin to threaten her, and thier relationship goes from there.

Personally I likes this book and the series that follows because it's extremely detailed. We learn in "A Discovery of Witches" what makes Human Witches Daemons and Vampires different in the genetic codeing, which is something that both interests me in general and is something that creates depth in the world of the story. Another really great thing in this is the characters and the relationship between Diana and Mathew. Everyone is written realisticly, which is very importent because no matter how good the plot of a story is, if the characters are bad it ruins everything.
A really memorable part of the story for me is the development of Diana and Mathew's relationship and how they were developed as characters together. I don't want to give anything away, so I won't go any further, but as a person who is driven to read books by the characters more than the plot, it's very satisfying.
I would recomend this book to people who enjoy fantasy elements, european history, and romantic subplots that don't overshadow the rest of the story.
I'm not going to try and convince you to go out and get this book, but if you are interested in it you should. "A Discovery of Witches" is the first book of the All Souls trilogy. The second book is "Shadow of Night", and the third is "The Book of Life". They come in French. I checked.

Passion Project Update

You know, they say on the page that they'll give you feedback and advice on your stories when they email you, but they really just don't.
Two more declinations.
I kind of feel bad for whoever is in charge of sending th emails because my phone went off at like ten thirty last night when I got them. Why do they have ot stay so late.
I also got these back like, really fast compared to the other four things I submitted. I guess they really didn't like them.
I'm not stopping though.

Someday. Someday it will happen.

Books I've read recently I would Reccomend 1-24-15

AKA The All Souls trillogy because that's going on the top list of Adult series' for the rest of my life.

Remember these?

 

Hella Rad book series. If you like modern magic, 3D characters, world bulding that makes sense and really cute romantic subplot that doesn't overshadow whats going on THEN BOY DO I HAVE GOOD NEWS.

It's slightly adult, I'm going to say that right off the batt. Diana and Mathew are adults that are in love and what do adults that are in love do? Eachother. It never gets detailed and only happens maybe six to eight times throughout ther series so it's really not that big of a deal. Really it's just cute because they love eachother and intimacy of any kind is adorable in my opinion. There's also like four-nine swear words in the last book because A- laybor is extremely painful and B- kidnapping Diana's family is not a thing you do without the rath of a god being dropped upon your head like an anvil in a looney toons episode.

      One thing that is really great about this series is that it's so realistic. The Author Deborah Harkness brings so much history and science into the world that the only loophole I can think of is a slight spoiler that I won't go through but if anything it's only big enough for a finger so it's easily over looked. She goes through the genetics that make the creatures (Witches, Daemons, Humans, and Vampires) different from eachother, which is totally a thing I'm into so as the world developed in that way I was just sort of like:

It's just really amazing and admirable from both a reader and author standpoint how much depth and thought Harkness (I can't find whether or not she's married so I'm really not sure what to put before her last name....) has put into the world. Her characters are well done, the things they go through are realisticly written (lets just say I have zero qustions on the physical effects of being a woman who is pregnant), and it's emotional in a realistic way. The world she spins pulls you in and envelopes you like a blanket but all to soon it ends and your just sitting there at the end of the last book like

Because you liked the ending BUT YOU DON'T WANT IT TO STOP.

All I can hope for is a series of short stories about the twins growing up. It would be great. Perhaps I could email her.

Take The Cannoli 1-20-15 page 1-65

     Now, this is another one of Sarah Vowell's books, but it isn't one based on history, or American History at least as most of her other books are. It is a personal history. Sort of a mish-mosh of stories about things from her life.
For Example: "Shooting Dad" the first title in this collection, is about how she and her dad don't really get along that well for varius reasons. ("About the only thing my father and I agree on is the Contitution, though I'm partial to the First Amendment, while he's always favored the Second.", "I am a gunsmith's daughter.", "All he ever cared about were guns. All I ever cared about was art.") She goes into all of this background about thier relationship, and ends up with a story about his home made fully functioning replica of a 19th century canon called "the Big Horn Gun"that he built from scratch. Despite her stance on guns and her personal dislike for them she decides to go with him to a forest preserve to light it off. She recorded the event for her local radio show, and was facinated by the sound levels that her recorder got from the canon going off. "The delicate needles which keep trach of the sound quality lurch into the bad, red zone so fast and so hard I'm surprised they don't break." It's there that she realizes how similare they are, after a hiker compliments her recording equitment. "My Dad and I are the same person. We're both smart-alecky loners with goofy projects and wierd equitment."

The second story is the about lessons she learned in marching band, such as how the band kids and the orchestra kids only truley unite through the unified disdane for the chorus, and how the only instrument she could play gracefully was the recorder; "which was already on it's way out of fashion during the lifetime of J. S. Bach." 
It's rather humorus.

The next one was about the Apocolypse and had a bunch of bible references I didn't get because I haven't read it yet so I had to skip it.
Same with the one the book is named after which came after the Apocolypse, which is centered around The Godfather which I've never seen and is probably still innapropriate for me to see.

I'll come back to these parts in a few years(the Apacolypse one sooner since I'm probably going to a Catholic highschool,) and read them, because there's no point in reading something that I'm not gonna get.