Currently Friday, September 30th, 2011

Game of Thrones: Pages read 100.

Quotes:
1.) "The High Hall of the Aryns was aglow with the light of fifty torches, burning in the scones along the walls."

2.) "What if you'd only wounded him? What if you had made his hand jump, or hit Bran instead? For all you knew, the man might have been wearing a breastplate, all you could see was the back of his cloak. What would have happened to my brother then? Did you ever think of that, Greyjoy?"

3.) "Robb glanced over at where Stiv lay sprawled in the stream, hi ragged black cloak moving fitfully as the rushing waters tugged at it."

My favorite is quote two because it gives a unique characterization of the character Greyjoy.

Currently Post With Quote of the Month

Game of Thrones: Pages Read:100

Quotes of the Month:
-"The rising sun sent fingers of light through the pale white mists of dawn. A wide plain spread out beneath them, bare and brown, its flatness here and there relieved by long, low hummocks."

-"Two seats away, the king had been drinking heavily all night. His broad face was flushed behind his great black beard. He made many a toast, laughed out loudly at every jest, and attacked each dish like a starving man, but beside him, the queen seemed as cold as an ice sculpture."

-"The godswood there was a garden, bright and airy, where tall red woods spread dappled shadows across tinkling streams, birds sang from hidden nests, and the air was spicy with the scent of flowers."

I like these quotes the best because of the imagery they create. All three of these sentences drip with branches, modifiers, and describers that paint a very pretty picture.

Best Posts

5 Favorite:
-Blogs With Friends:
In this photo it seems that a group friends are marking the end of an era or the start of something new, the arms outstretched are either reaching for something that's gone or welcoming something that is coming.
 -Golb:
In this scene you see Blake Griffin dunking a basketball, his expressions show his immense, powerful, and colossal body floating in the air, putting the extravagant crown into a short time of faint, quiet, and peaceful time before they erupted into a thundering and noisy crowd.
-Memoirs of a White Latino:
"The Hollow"'s dark, jagged scenery emanates the state of internal desperation and broken loneliness that is expressed constantly throughout the album.
-Swimstrong:
In Versace's purple ruffled gown, his fading colors, smooth lines, and rough and fragile textures along with a flowing and clean shape create a complimentary and whimsical sense of beauty in fashion-art.
-DolphinCat:
Team iLuminate’s performance on NBC’s Americas Got Talent the groups [jerky but elegant movements, strange and breath-taking choreography, and rapid roaming use of space]

Favorite Claim: DolphionCat had the most unique object to observe in my opinion. 


I think Memoirs of a White Latino and Dolphin cat had the best claims simply because of how they were worded and what they described.

Observing and Making an Inference

Object: Cars
Elements:
Shape: curved, flat, low, wide, fluid, and smooth
Sound: deafening, loud, noisy, resonant, and thundering
Appearance: clean, colorful, distinct, shiny, and smoggy

Tones: aggressive, animated, majestic and vibrant

Sentence:
With a curved and fluid body, a deafening roar and clean and colorful finish and the majestic way they drive on the roads, cars today express an animated and aggressive vibrance that is all themselves.

Game of Thrones...TV vs. Book

So, in case I haven't blogged about this(honestly can't remember if I did or not) then I'll tell you now. I started watching the Game of Thrones TV series and was pleasantly surprised to find out that with each episode being one hour long, and even though multiple chapters are squeezed into one episode, the season is as accurate as it could have been to the book. They use direct quotes that I easily recognize from the book.

On another note, I've found that the plot of the book is fro lack of a better word, awesome! I would have never guessed it. Game of Thrones is full of conspiracies, Treason, murder, death, adventure, love, coming of age and more! To me, this book is everything Lord of the Rings was not.

Poem of the Month

The three poems we've read that I have most enjoyed were Poem to Be Read at 3 AM, The History of Desire, and First Kiss. These are my favorites because they are the silliest, but yet they still make you think about the author's intentions and underlying meaning. A good author accomplishes this with ease and I think these poems have done that.

Currently Sept. 16th, 2011

Pages read: 100 pages

Game of Thrones Quotes:
1. Whatever pride his lord father might have had felt at Samwell's birth vanished as the boy grew up plump, soft, and awkward.

2. Hours later, as the castle slept, three of them paid a call on his cell. Grenn held his arms while Pyp sat on his legs. Jon could hear Rast's rapid breathing as Ghost leapt onto his chest. The direwolf's eyes burned red as embers as his teeth nipped at the soft skin of the boy's throat, just enough to draw blood. "Remember, we know where you sleep," Jon said softly.

The first quote is my favorite because it is a great example of what a good author can do with words; creating a picture in the reader's mind.

Personality Test

The test says my "type" is INFJ

slightly expressed introvert

distinctively expressed intuitive personality

distinctively expressed feeling personality

slightly expressed judging personality

Doesn't seem too far off I suppose...

Currently Post

Number of Pages Read this week: 190 pgs.

Game of Thrones UPDATE 4

As I read, I find that it is seemingly impossible to determine what happens next in this book. It seems like the book is twist after crazy, unexpected, twist. From an atempted muder within Lord Stark's family to the fact that it might possibly be the Queen who is behind it and "treason" is the first thought in everyone's mind, Game of Thrones is a rollercoaster ride that doesn't seem to end, ever. I'm really excited to find out what happens next.

Week 2 Blog Tour

Here's my list of nine blog visits...

The Chief
Less Than Three
E-Dubs
Read Between the Blog
Memoirs of a White Latino
Dolphincat
Purple Moments
Organization of...
Hipsteroku

UPDATE FOR ETY

In the last week, I've read from Game of Thrones, and Mila 18.

Game of Thrones: 50 pages this week and 85 last week.
Mila 18: 52 this week and 85 last week.

Total read this week:112 pages.
Total read last week:175 pages.
Total read this semester: 197 pages.

Favotire quotes can be found under the post: Quotes O' The Week!

Choice in Posts

I find it interesting. I am actually reading three different books at the same time. I'm reading Game of Thrones, Timeline by Michael Crichton, and Mila 18 by Leon Uris, yet the only book I've talked about is Game of Thrones. For what ever reason, I can't seem to put it down. I will probably find time to blog about the other two books sometime but not now...later perhaps.

That is all...

Game of Thrones UPDATE 3

It's funny, the whole reason I wanted to even start thus book was because the HBO TV show looked good. I had known that it was based on a book series and that the series was supposed to be very good as were the books by author George R. R. Martin, but I had not really intended on reading the series. I normally don't read very often, but I saw that we had the entire Game of Thrones series in our home library so I decided that it would be a great book to start while I watched the TV series in parallel to see how they differ. Now, I have no desire to touch the TV series until I'm done with the book! Haha, it's weird how that works. Although the series is supposed to actually do good, as most book to TV series are normally not great, I still feel that with the amount of work that was put into this book, the TV series cannot possibly do it justice. Who knows though. Maybe I will watch it after all and find that I like it all the same. My suspicion is that I will like the TV series, but not as an adaptation form the book. I will probably just like it as a TV show alone and no more.

Quotes O' The Week!(Game of Thrones)

-The rising sun sent fingers of light through the pale white mists of dawn. A wide plain spread out beneath them, bare and brown, its flatness here and there relieved by long, low hummocks.

-Dawn broke as they crested a low ridge, and finally the king pulled up. By then were miles south of the of the main party. Robert flushed and exhilarated as Ned reigned up beside him.

-As angry as he was, his father could not help but laugh. "You're not my son," he told Bran when they fetched him down, "you're a squirrel. So be it. If you must climb, then climb, but try not to let your mother see you."

More on Viking Death Metal...

Here are a few links to some of my favorite Viking Death metal songs if you are so inclined to take a listen...

Amon Amarth: Pursuit of Vikings...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPRt6Tt6RyM

Amon Amarth: War of the Gods...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVAQQujgSxQ&feature=related

Ensiferum: From Afar...
ensiferum from afar

Tyr: Hold the Heathen Hammer High...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fu2bgwcv43o

Powerwolf: Sanctified With Dynamite...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3HSnWDAJpc

Well, there you are...hope you enjoy!

Game of Thrones UPDATE 2

While reading Martin's Game of Thrones, it amazes me at how well these characters are developed. I think I can safely say that this is the first time I have ever actually cared about what happened to the characters in the book. The shear amount of detail that Martin uses to tell each character's back-story and tell of the very rich history of this made up world really is remarkable. I've read the Lord of The Rings trilogy and Stephan King's The Dark Tower series and I find that, while all three of these series are great in their respects, Martin's, to me, is the most well defined. I find it interesting how he jumps from one character's situation to another's in each chapter. I will read one chapter and, "get in the groove", if you will, of that character and what is going on, then int he next chapter, Martin switches to a completely different character in a completely different area of the world. Through all of this, he still manages to tie all the the character's stories together. In fact, it is fairly early on in the book that it is evident to the reader that all of these characters are tied together in a very interesting way. This constant switching actually drives me a little crazy at times,because I'll be reading and want to just continue with tat one character until their story is finished, but I feel that this book and the whole series really would not be as rich as it is now if Martin had written his books like any other regular story out there today.