Rainbows and Rain :: Personal Narrative Sports Frisbee Essays

Rainbows and Rain I sit on my bed taking off my cleats as I hang the Frisbee over the huge torn chunk of wall, caused my removal of the corkboard and the wonders of â€Å"wall tape.† I finish my dinner and realize that the great idea of placing my plate into my â€Å"Frisbee tray" is not such a great idea when the plate is permanently stuck inside the Frisbee for a whole three minutes as struggle to pull it out. I scale the roof of my grandmother’s cabin in order to save my Frisbee from beating rains, intolerable sun, and absolute loneliness. I scale the steep weeds and ivy groves in order to save my Frisbee from the treacherous rivers which roars below. I pull and huck the Frisbee. I toss and pass the Frisbee. My hands turn red and chapped in the cold and fast and sweet in the heat. The Frisbee sails in the sky meeting the sunset horizons before a swift catch and speedy throw sends it again, through a similar cycle, of something I call magic. To sprint, and just believe that if I reach out far enough I will perfectly meet the disc and it will meet my hand as one total motion has been completed. The power of running as the Frisbee flies over your head, as you lose all sense of gravity to make the final grasp at spinning disc, is the beginning of the high. Just before you meet the ground, whether it a be serious layout or you end up tasting grass, dirt, fertilizer, it’s a worth it, just as long as you have caught the Frisbee. And the high sinks into the spirituality of it all; victory is possible in that mighty catch. Truly we are Heroins. This, my friends, is the sport the absolute addiction, of one single disc, cleats (or no shoes if you prefer), some grudging comfy clothing, H2O, and a heroin teammate. But it's not just throwing and catching, which I cannot resist. And I mean I really cannot accept the idea of people throwing out in the quad without me. If players of old, and players of new are throwing the Frisbee all I can do is join. Even in HI, at Kona beach, people were throwing---no one I knew---I knew that I just had to play and they were totally cool about it all.

A Continuous Decline In India, Without Modernization :: essays research papers fc

A Continuous Decline in India, Without Modernization Hypothesis: Modernization is the Key to economic growth for India. If modernization occurs, then the economic status of India will increase tremendously, even if the price India has to pay is a change in culture, and tradition. India has remained financially stagnant since its beginnings. One may argue that non-modernization has plagued this sub-continent in economic growth and development since early times. One may continue to argue that if modernization occurs, India will achieve in many different ways, including economically, socially, and nationally. In order for modernization to occur, India must move from small scale industrialization to large scale industrialization. If this occurs India will become much more financially sound and achieve a higher status in the world. Modernization will bring many positive change to India, but people may argue that "modernization" will bring destruction to the Indian civilization. By bringing modernization, many jobs will be taken over by machines. Unfortunately, this process will result in the elimination of jobs done by local peasants. There are many additional prices India will have to pay to be able to modernize, including: (1) a loss of culture and tradition; (2) probable religious conflicts; (3) loss of caste; (4) social divisions; and, of course (5) TAXES. With modernization, taxes will definitely increase for India to pay for the new advances in industry and technology. Taxes are the primary means for any government to raise money and support its programs. However, the overall price that India will have to pay will be relatively small compared to the positive changes modernization will bring. When India became independent its leaders recognized the urgency of strengthening the Indian economy. The leaders of new India were determined to raise the standard of living, which was among the lowest of the major nations in the world. Indian leaders agreed to establish a "mixed economy," which combines the use of private capital and public in he development of industry, mining and farming. If modernization occurs there will be change from traditional order. The model of change assumes: (1) a sharp dichotomy between the traditional and modern order, including the order of mutual exclusiveness, and (2) the change from one to another is predicted in terms of a historically deterministic pattern, that is, it must take place in a certain predetermined sequence. If this happens, India will have a better economy and a higher standard of living. Through greater economic prosperity, India will also obtain better health care. Also industry will promote a better education system by encouraging students to study for more technical and professional jobs. Finally modernization will foster a better sense of nationalism, as future generations

Art of the Romantic Period

During the Romantic period, composers had shown their romantic side. The expressive part in all artists was being shown. The passion in art, the variety of bold colors, the freedom of expression, and how one feels through the sound of a piano or violin, it was all being shown. Much of what the classical period was still remained during the romantic period, but to most, the romantic period was so much more. The music was more emotional and expressive, and had even influenced artists that weren’t musicians to be romantic as well. All artists were becoming the romantics of the time, and what a time it was for the arts. The romantic period will always be remembered as a time in history when passion was important, expression was used, and emotion was seen and heard. There are many characteristics involved in the romantic period. The individuality of style was an important characteristic. Each composer had his own style that showed his innermost feelings through and expressed emotional piece of work. Expressive aims and subjects were also important during this period. The romantics explored a universe of feelings that included intimacy and flamboyance, melancholy and unpredictability, longing and rapture Romanticism (1820-1900) in music was brought to the world during the early nineteenth century. This music stressed emotion, imagination, and individualism. The Romantic period was about freedom of expression and breaking away from time-honored conventions. This period in time had influenced many, or even all of the arts. Painters used bolder and more brilliant colors in their works. Also, they had preferred dynamic motion to gracefully balanced poses. Poetry was also changed during the romantic period. Emotional subjectivity was a basic quality in every type of art during this time. Many artists had become â€Å"romantics† and had become drawn to the realm of fantasy: the unconscious, the irrational, and the world of dreams. Romantics were fascinated with the middle age, the time of chivalry and romance. What neoclassicists had thought of to be the â€Å"dark ages†, the romantics had cherished. The spirit of revolution was â€Å"a dedication to the principles of equality, reason, and a representative government. † (Bishop 323) With the overthrow of Kings in America and France it did not stop the injustices or establish a utopia of reason. With the middle class growing a society developed and a new sensibility arose called romanticism, which glorified the individual and prized feelings over reason and intellect. â€Å"This period of revolutionary change and romantic reaction (1775-1850) laid down the principles, and discovered the demons of the first modern society. † (Bishop 323) Elements of romantic art and literature came about to respond to different social and historical circumstances. Poets of this time argued against the social injustices of early society. A woman named Mary Wollstonecraft wanted equal rights for woman, and a Spanish painter Goya bitterly depicted the cruelty of war. Authors in England and North America such as Wordsworth and Emerson saw nature as a mirror of the human imagination. Painters developed now techniques of color and light to render the natural landscape’s sublime beauty. Other people sought escape in the past, and had a taste for picturesque medieval architecture. As the industrial life became dull and mechanical, the lure of exotic lands spurred the imaginations of architects such as Nash and painters such as Delacroix and Ingres. The people of the romantic age were fascinated with evil, the demonic, and the grotesque and the dark side of things that were reflected in the novel, with its medieval setting and tortured characters. The most famous Gothic novel was Mary Shelley’s â€Å"Frankenstein†, which was a summation of the romantic motifs: â€Å"the genius, the noble savage, the protest against injustice, and the fascination with evil. † At one point in the study of the Romantic period of music, we come upon the first of several apparently opposing conditions that plague all attempts to grasp the meaning of Romantic as applied to the music of the 19th century. This opposition involved the relation between music and words. If instrumental music is the perfect Romantic art, why is it acknowledged that the great masters of the symphony, the highest form of instrumental music, were not Romantic composers, but were the Classical composers, Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven? Moreover, one of the most characteristic 19th century genres was the Lied, a vocal piece in which Shubert, Schumann, Brahams, and Wolf attained a new union between music and poetry. Furthermore, a large number of leading composers in the 19th century were extremely interested and articulate in literary expression, and leading Romantic novelists and poets wrote about music with deep love and insight. The conflict between the ideal of pure instrumental music (absolute music) as the ultimate Romantic mode of expression, and the strong literary orientation of the 19th century, was resolved in the conception of program music. Program music, as Liszt and others in the 19th century used the term, is music associated with poetic, descriptive, and even narrative subject matter. This is done not by means of musical figures imitating natural sounds and movements, but by imaginative suggestion. Program music aimed to absorb and transmit the imagined subject matter in such a way that the resulting work, although â€Å"programmed†, does not sound forced, and transcends the subject matter it seeks to represent. Instrumental music thus became a vehicle for the utterance of thoughts which, although first hinted in words, may ultimately be beyond the power of words to fully express. Practically every composer of the era was, to some degree, writing program music, weather or not this was publicly acknowledged. One reason it was so easy for listeners to connect a scene or a story or a poem with a piece of Romantic music is that often the composer himself, perhaps unconsciously, was working from some such ideas. Writers on music projected their own conceptions of the expressive functions of music into the past, and read Romantic programs into the instrumental works not only of Beethoven, but also the likes of Mozart, Haydn, and Bach! The diffused scenic effects in the music of such composers as Mendelssohn and Schumann seem pale when compared to the feverish, and detailed drama that constitutes the story of Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique (1830). Because his imagination always seemed to run in parallel literary and musical channels, Berlioz once subtitled his work â€Å"Episode in the life of an artist†, and provided a program for it which was in effect a piece of Romantic autobiography. In later years, he conceded that if necessary, when the symphony was performed by itself in concert, the program would need not be given out for the music would â€Å"of itself, and irrespective of any dramatic aim, offer an interest in the musical sense alone. † The principle formal departure in the symphony is the recurrence of the opening theme of the first Allegro, the idee fixe. This, according to the program, is the obsessive image of the hero's beloved, that recurs in the other movements. To mention another example: in the coda of the Adagio there is a passage for solo English horn and four Tympani intended to suggest â€Å"distant thunder†. The foremost composer of program music after Beriloz was Franz Liszt, twelve of whose symphonic poems were written between 1848 and 1858. The name symphonic poem is significant: these pieces are symphonic, but Liszt did not call them symphonies, presumably because or their short length, and the fact that they are not divided up into movements. Instead, each is a continuos form with various sections, more or less varied in tempo and character, and a few themes that are varied, developed, or repeated within the design of the work. Les Preludes, the only one that is still played much today, is well designed, melodious, and efficiently scored. However, its idiom causes it to be rhetorical in a sense. It forces today's listeners to here lavishly excessive emotion on ideas that do not seem sufficiently important for such a display of feeling.

Black Cat Discussion Questions

1. From what point of view is Poe’s story told and why is this view particularly effective for this story? The story is being told from a first person narrative point of view. Poe chooses the first person narration to give the reader a better level of understanding of the characters emotion, mental state and setting the plot for the story. With the narrator’s sick and twisted mind, the story becomes more interesting. The most important effect the narrator portrays is his mental state. Without his narration you cannot get the full effect of this murderous madman. The glee at my heart was too strong to be restrained. I burned to say if but one word, by way of triumph, and to render doubly sure their assurance of my guiltlessness† (7). The narrator has no remorse or guilt for killing his wife. For the narrator to say guiltlessness just goes to show how crazy he really became. A normal healthy person would never commit such an act nor have any remorse. 2. Explain how the reader knows the narrator is an unreliable narrator? The narrator’s opinions and actions are so far from normal that you are forced to wonder what is the real interpretation and reality of a madman.Insanity and unstableness are very unreliable sources. How do you know what to believe or if there is any truth behind what they say? â€Å"Mad indeed would I be to expect it, in a case where my very senses reject their own evidence† (1). Using the word expect, is like he is already setting up the reader not to believe what he is going to say. The narrator blames the alcohol for his erratic and violent behavior. How reliable can one be if he blames his actions on drinking? You are your own person and make your own choice regardless of alcohol.Yes, alcohol can be mined altering, but you still no the difference between right and wrong. 3. The murderer takes great precautions to commit the perfect crime. What trips him up? Explain. The narrator makes you believe he has comm itted the perfect murder. He assures the reader that no one can tell the difference in the wall. How the plaster matched perfectly and the bricks look as they had never been dissembled. He is so sure of his work that he believes the police will not even look at him as a suspect. â€Å"The second and the third day passed, and still my tormentor came not.Once again I breathed as a freeman† (6). When the police come back for the fourth time, the narrator speaks about how strong the wall are and making comments. Then he starts hearing the cat that he buried with his wife in the wall. The main cause for the narrator’s trip was his guilt and vein he carried. Nothing ever turns out perfect as planned. Works Cited Poe, Edgar Allan. The Black Cat. N. p. : n. p. , n. d. 7. Print. Poe, Edgar Allan. The Black Cat. N. p. : n. p. , n. d. 1. Print. Poe, Edgar Allan. The Black Cat. N. p. : n. p. , n. d. 6. Print.

Eco Plastic Solution Essay

This case focuses on determination of the cost of capital for a firm. The student determines the cost of individual sources of financing, including long-term debt, preferred stock, and common stock. The cost of debt is adjusted for Eco Plastics’ 40% tax bracket. The company is considering a new financial structure, with the replacement of preferred stock financing with debt financing. Additional use of debt increases the common stockholders’ required rate of return. The student is asked to compare the two weighted average costs of capital and identify the better financial structure for Eco Plastics Company. a. Cost of debt: Proceeds from sale of $1,000 par value bond: $1,000 − (average discount & floatation costs) $1,000 − ($45 + $32) = $923 Subsequent payments: Interest payments ($1,000 Ãâ€" 0.105) + Par value Before-tax cost of debt N = 20, PV = $923, PMT = −105, FV = −1,000 Solve for I = 11.50% After-tax cost of debt: ri = rd (1-T) = 11.5% (1−0.4) = 6.9% b. Cost of preferred stock: rp = Dp à · Np = (0.095 Ãâ€" $95) à · ($95 – $7) = $9.02 à · $88 = 10.25% c. Cost of common stock: rj = RF + [bj Ãâ€" (rm − RF)] = 0.04 + [1.3 Ãâ€" (0.13 − 0.04)] = 0.04 + [1.3 Ãâ€" 0.09] = 0.04 + 0.1170 = 15.7% d. Weighted average cost of capital: ra = (wi Ãâ€" ri) + (wp Ãâ€" rp) + (ws Ãâ€" rn) = (0.30 Ãâ€" 0.069) + (0.20 Ãâ€" 0.1025) + (0.50 Ãâ€" 0.157) = 0.0207 + 0.0205 + 0.785 = 0.1197, or about 12% e. 1. Change in risk Premium: Change in beta Ãâ€" market risk premium = (1.5 − 1.3) Ãâ€" (0.13 − 0.04) = 0.2 Ãâ€" 0.09 = 0.018 Shareholders require 1.8% more per year New cost of common equity: rj = RF + [bj Ãâ€" (rm − RF)] = 0.04 + [1.5 Ãâ€" (0.13 − 0.04)] = 0.04 + [1.5 Ãâ€" 0.09] = 0.04 + 0.1350 = 17.5% Note: 17.5% − 15.7% = 1.8% 2. Revised weighted average cost of capital: ra= (wi x ri) + (ws x rn) = (0.50 Ãâ€" 0.069) + (0.50 Ãâ€" 0.175) = 0.0345 + 0.0875 = 0.1220 3. Eco Plastics’ CFO should retain the cheaper current financial structure. Replacing preferred stock financing with debt financing results in more risk to the stockholders. The increase in stockholders’ required rate of return is more than offsets the advantage of using the low cost debt. If Eco Plastics’ CFO were to revise the capital structure, share price would fall and shareholder wealth would not be maximized.

Strategy mapping & the learning and growth perspective Essay

Strategy mapping & the learning and growth perspective - Essay Example There has been a significant revolution in the business environment attributed to formulation and implementation of strategy mapping. On the other hand, prosperity in process of formulating and implementing strategy mapping in organizations has been facilitated by application or incorporation of Balance Scorecards In this case, strategy mapping has been applied in processes of facilitating learning and growth in various organizations, while balance scorecard is used in implementation and evaluation process (Sharma, 2012). Nevertheless, this paper explains processes involved in formulation and implementation of strategy mapping, its relation to performance management, thereby establishing value propositions; in fact, this discussion will be established theoretically. The ultimate purpose of implementing strategy mapping in an organization is to bridge learning and growth gap. In this case, strategy mapping offers sets of guidelines, which facilitate increased performance management in an organization. Besides, Armitage and Scholey (2006) explain that strategy mapping offers these guidelines in a systematic format. Strategy mapping has also been considered a reference, based on four principle interest groups. Strategy mapping based on learning and growth point of view resonates around employee capabilities and other success factors. In this case, Sharma (2012) explains that employees’ capabilities relate to their levels of skills, access to transactions, continuous training and development programs. In addition, it also focuses on employee satisfaction, which has been regarded as precondition for facilitating employee productivity and level of quality in services offered to customers. Other growth factors facilitated by strategy mapping include information system capabilities, motivation and empowerment of employees in an organization (Sharma, 2012). Numerous organizations have been seeking guidance and directives to supplement effort required in implement ation of maps and scorecards. Therefore, strategic mapping and Balance Scorecards has become solutions to organizations’ problems, whereby they serves as a bridge between theories gathered from different literature and processes of implementation. On the other hand, other organizations are seeking certain consultants, which can offer benefits based on framework in strategic mapping guidelines. Furthermore, Armitage and Scholey (2006) assert that other organizations stand chance of benefiting from strategic mapping by becoming consultants. Strategy mapping facilitates communication of strategies in organizations, given that they provide guidelines, which in turn describe model applied in implementation process. The strategy map developed through this model is helpful to managers in organization (National Institute of Standards & Technology [NIST], 2012). In this case, these strategy maps become solutions to problems faced in processes of executing a strategy. Besides, these ma ps help organizations to attain desired results, through a substantially developed strategy meant to improve and align various functions in an organization. Some of these functions include, strategy planning, budgeting, compensating employees and monitoring their performance (Armitage & Scholey, 2006). In addition, strategic mapping offers ways to improve chances of implementing learning and growth strategies in organizations in order to facilitate effective operating and financial performance. Nonetheless, this paper will also focus on conducting analysis, which presents actual comparison and contrast between BAA’

Using virtual worlds Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Using virtual worlds - Essay Example The sign up process is one which is rather easy and one which a person can easily comprehend. This is because the things which are demanded are within reach of the person who is interested. For starters, a person has to come up with an avatar, which is the equivalent of a photo. The user then has to choose a preferable username and check whether it is available for use or whether it has been taken by another user. After this, the user has to give some personal information such as the date of birth and the email. After this is done, the account can be activated. Some of the issues which were encountered in the course of this is the fact that it may be difficult for an individual to set up an avatar because some people may not prefer to use their own photos. Coming up with a username may also be a difficult affair because identity is something which people may want to safeguard. In as much as there are good things associated with the site, especially on the side of an individual’s social life, there are some security concerns which may come up in the course of using the site. The first one in this case is when an individual gives out too much information to an extent that another party may use this information to bring harm to the person. The second one is that there may be unscrupulous individuals who may pose as authentic users when in actual sense they may be having ill intentions and in the end up causing harm to the user. There are limited privacy settings which may still be surpassed by people who may want to cause online harm. For example, the passwords of the users may be hacked. This online interaction platform is one of the many internet platforms which are being developed for the purpose of boosting the way people relate with each other. There are those people who prefer to interact over the internet as opposed to doing so in private. This is where the