[FREE] A Dream Deferred

The answer I have to the question "What happens to a dream deferred?" is different for everybody in the world. Because most people will say whatever forget it I am done and they just completely give up but a small amount of others will continue to try hard until they accomplish there life long dream.

There are very few people who keep trying after they fail once or twice because they simply think they have given it there all and they still could not succeed which is wrong, if you fail you did not do your best and if you did your best you need to work a lot harder to make your best even better than it already is. For the people who failed once and are in between weather you want to keep trying than you should probably think it over weather you even want to try for that again because sometimes you just feel you would rather do something else than that thing you tried before.

But sometimes it can be very hard to just all of the sudden be told you can not live your dream and you just need to quickly move on and forget about it but that is the hardest thing to to do, forget about your old dream and move on to something else. But the people that fail many many times are the ones who work the hardest to get better and work harder and in the end are the best at what they do because they never gave up on their dream.

[RE] Al Davis

This is my response to Brandon's post about Al Davis passing away.

"This past Saturday Al Davis past away it is a great loss to the Raiders organization. In my point of view he was the best owner to ever live." 


I agree with Brandon one hundred percent on what he said about Al Davis, most people don't realize what he did for the game, most people only see the bad things he did later on in his life. Had he never done all the things he football would probably be one of the more boring sports, he came up with the idea of stretching the field by throwing the long pass and going for touchdowns instead of just first downs, he came up with the idea of moving the goal post to the back of the end zone so it would not interfere with the game.

Al Davis also took over the Raiders in 1963 and lead them to the greatest single season turnaround that still stands to this day. He became the team owner in 1966 and in 1969 he hired John Madden at head coach which many did not agree with because Madden was only 32 and was the AFL's youngest coach at the time. This turnout to be one of the greatest moves of all time because Madden never had a losing season in his eight years as a head coach. He also lead the Raiders to their first Super Bowl win in 1976 when they posted a 13-1 record and dominated the Vikings 32-14 in Super Bowl XI. Madden is now in the NFL Hall of Fame and  considered by some the greatest coach of all time.

He then hired the first ever Latino head coach, Tom Flores who went out and won the Raiders two more super bowls in which they dominated the Eagles in 1980 and the Redskins in 1983. So basically Al Davis was the best of all time.

[FREE] Carson Palmer Traded to Raiders

This morning at about 7:30 I was listening to the radio when they came on with a breaking news update saying that now former Bengals quarterback Carson Palmer had been traded to the Raiders for a 2012 first round draft pick and a conditional draft pick in 2013 depending on if incentives in his contract are met with the Raiders this season.

Palmer has a history with Raiders head coach Hue Jackson who recruited him to the University Of Southern California and was the wide receivers coach in Cinci from 2004-2006. Palmer had said earlier this year that if he wasn't traded he would retire, but when Bengals owner Mike Brown said he would not be traded and forced to retire.

Of course with this happening the Raiders will have to redo his contract so they do not exceed the salary cap which they only have six million, Palmer is do 6.9 million dollars this season. This trade was a big surprise to some but others it was not, because on this Sunday the Raiders played the Browns here in Oakland when their starting quarterback, Jason Campbell broke his collar bone and we have been told he said if everything goes right he could be back in six weeks but most likely no sooner than that.

The biggest surprise to me is that the Raiders traded their first round draft pick which leaves them with only s sixth round pick in the 2012 NFL Draft but the Raiders may get some draft picks because of free agents that left this off season so the Raiders may get some okay drat picks but as of now the Raiders only have a sixth round draft pick.

(BW) Steve Jobs quote

If somebody ever asked me how to make a big decision that could affect the rest of their life, I would tell them they only had one life and try to live everyday as if it is their last just like Steve Jobs said in his speech. Most people do not realize that sooner rather than later their life will be nearing its end and people will look back and have some many regrets and they would do anything to go back and see what it would have affected there life in any type of way. You only have one life so live it to the fullest and have a great time while being safe and living a regret free live and never think about what if I did that or anything like that. People do not realize that your life will one day come to an end and it does very fast, I feel like just yesterday I was five years old and getting ready to start school, now I am sixteen years old and a sophomore at Alameda High School and I will tell you first hand it went by way too fast and I wish I could be five again and be in kindergarten just coloring and learning how to read. I think life is really just about living it up and completely forgetting about the past and putting out the bad things and remembering great times and putting the bad times behind you.

Steve Jobs seemed like one of those people who would always forget the past inventions if they failed and focus on what he could do to make it better and how it can work better than the past invention that came out. These are the reasons why he was so brilliant and will truly be missed by all that love electronics because he was able to just keep coming out with something better than before and it had more features than the previous one and he was able to sell so many of these because of what they did. He may have been one of the smartest people to ever live and make such a huge living on electronic products that he could just keep producing forever had he been here forever.  It truly was sad to see possibly the most brilliant man to ever step foot on this earth go so soon just as all the products were getting even more advance then they had in the past few years. I am sure on day they will come out with some sort of computer the size of an iPhone but can do all the things that laptops do today and I am sure these will replace all laptops and desktops too. This will be a great invention because you will be able to carry it around in your pocket and be able to access the internet at all time no matter where you are at the time and they may even include a phone with this too.

[FREE] Raiders vs Texans

On Sunday October 9th the Oakland Raiders traveled to Houston to play the Texans for the fifth straight year, it is not usual for teams in different divisions to play this many times in a row but every year when the Raiders schedule comes out I see the Texans on it. Ever since 2006 the Raiders and Texans have played against each other, the Raiders have only beat the Texans once time since the Texans came into the NFL in 2001, every year even when the Texans are not good they seem to always play a great game against us. The Texans are one of only five teams that have a all time winning record vs the Raiders, so the Texans always put up a good fight when they play the Raiders.

This game did not start out the way I would have liked the Raiders went three and out on their opening drive, they punted to the Texans and the Texans went straight down the field on the Raiders defense and scored an opening drive touchdown. Then on the Raiders next drive they went three and out and punted the ball away, on one of the Texans first plays the Raiders Lamarr Houston intercepted the ball and the Raiders offense took over but again went three and out but this time they got a field goal from the NFL's best kicker, Sebastian Janikowski. After the teams exchanged a few more three and outs and the Raiders added another field goal and the Texans another touchdown, the Raiders wide receiver, Darrius Heyward-Bey caught a 34 yard touchdown from QB Jason Campbell putting the Raiders within two points at the half. The Raiders added a touchdown and a field goal while the Texans added a field goal and missed a field goal.

So here it is seven seconds and on play for the Texans at the five yard line down by five, The Texans QB scrambled left and threw up a lob ball for the end zone when Mike Huff saved the day with an interception with no time left and the Raiders winning in dramatic fashion for their owner Al Davis who died one day before this game.  

[ESSAY] Human Nature

Human nature is something that is different for almost all humans on this planet. But for one I think human nature is the way we think, act, and have emotions toward each other. Humans act different towards each other differently than most animals do, when animals see each other for the first time they circle one another and then they usually bark or hiss or whatever that animal does. I am not saying all animals act that way when they first meet but most do. It is also the way we feel in some situations such as good moments when we are happy and bad moments when we are sad or angry. But that is the way we humans are and that is how we will always be.

For example, when people tell us something that we would consider bad news at the time that would either make you sad, mad, angry, or possibly upset. There are many ways someone would react to such news, but most will explode and let it ruin their spirit and others who can handle anger and just do their best to hold most of it in. The people that can hold it in probably have the best self-control and handle their anger very well. Others well just immediately lose their mind and most likely take it out on others for no reason at all this is bad because you should not take out your anger on others who are undeserving but you will also feel better if you let it all out at once then you will if you hold it in for a long time. In my personal opinion I would say let it all out at once and be done with it, but do not take it out on people who have nothing to do with your problems. I am one of those people that just explodes at once but I really do try very hard not to get mad at undeserving people but I do have to admit that I have done that in the past and I really do feel very bad for doing that so I have done my best to work on my anger issues. I have tried to find other ways to let out my anger and there are several and I have tried most such as punch a pillow which I have to admit works the best for me, but there are many others that do work very well, everyone has their own opinion.

Another example of an emotion is when you hear very good news you either get happy, excited, or ecstatic and these are all very great feelings. When you get these feelings you feel like you are on top of the world and nobody or nothing can bring you down and it is just amazing how wonderful you feel at these times. There are many ways to get these feelings such as doing great on a very hard test or getting a great grade on your final and knowing you are going to have a great grade in a very difficult class. It may be something other such as doing really good in a sport that you love which in my case would be having a great baseball game against a great team and you just go out and destroy them. Or for some it may be playing a great football team and you run for over two hundred yards and scored three touchdowns and you win the game by twenty points when nobody thought you could win the game and you do and everyone is in awe that your team just did that. I remember when my football team won the championship and it just felt so great that all that hard work throughout the season finally paid off in the end and it was probably the greatest feeling I have had throughout my almost six teen years on planet Earth. I wish I could have that feeling another time in my life and hopefully in the future sometime when I am much older and things are much more important when I am an adult working hard to make a lot of money and being very successful in life.

Finally, there are many times in life when you are sad but you are not mad, angry or frustrated. There are also many times when you are mad and not sad or you are happy and not excited or not ecstatic. There have been many times in my life when I have been very happy like when I get a good grade but, I am not excited for anything because there is not much to be excited about when you are in that situation. But right now for me I am very happy and very excited because my sixteenth birthday is coming up in the next couple weeks and I cannot wait to be sixteen.  But sometimes people are very sad but they are not mad like when somebody close to you passes away most people are not mad they are just very sad and upset. It is really hard to describe all the emotions humans have at one time but most have the time we humans have tons of things running through our bodies and brains all of it at one time is just amazing and indescribable for most people when trying to explain to others.

Human nature or what it means to be a human is the way we act toward others or the emotions we have in certain situations weather we are happy or sad everybody will always have different thoughts or opinions no matter any situation we are in at the time. Being a human and having our own thoughts that can mean something in the world is what makes us different then animals who will never have an opportunity to share their thoughts which in a way is very sad because even if they are animals we don’t know what is going on but we humans are very lucky to be able to share all of our feelings with everyone and that is what it means to be a human.   

               

   

  

[FREE] Island Bowl

Today in a couple of hours i will be on my way to the Alameda High School Hornets versus the Encinal High School Jets. I am very excited for the game because I have gone the last to years and both of them did not go the way I wanted them to. But for some reason i have a feeling this one will be different from the past two that I went too. I am not sure what kinda feeling this is but it is just one of those undescribable feelings that you cannot explain in the least bit, but it is a good feeling. I really hope the Hornets can win this one because for one it is at Encinal and it would be cool if they one there and two I know a lot of people that go there it would be fun to talk trash to them like they always do to me when Encinal wins.

I know Encinal probobley has the better team that means nothing, it is not who has the better team it is who plays the better game and if the Hornets can work hard as a team they can easily take this one home. I really just hope the hornets can play a better game but Encinal has a very good team and some very fast and some very good players but I just hope that the Hornets can pull off the big time upset tonight. So all I have to say is Lets Go Hornets!!!

[BC] Dark Room

A man is looking for his keys in a pitch black dark room but he cannot find them. He is very upset because he needs to go to work but he can't without his keys. He is furious because his girl friend has just left him and he needs to get to work before he is fired for missing too much work in the past month. He as been struggling to pay the bills because he has been missing a lot of work due to so many problems at home with his family and his girl friend. He is on the verge of losing his job because more work is coming in and other people are working harder and he is working less and his boss is becoming very annoyed with his lack of work.

He then walks into his bedroom when he thinks he hears some kind of noise in the living room, he decides to ignore it as it was probably just nothing and he continues to look for his keys. Suddenly he hears a window break and now he is very scared, he wants to go see what is going on but he is too nervous and terrified. So he ran into the kitchen as fast as he could and he grabbed his biggest knife and slowly walked towards the living room. He slowly walked and looked around the corner to see what was going on in the living room, he saw nothing, he felt so relieved that nobody was in his house, but he still thinks something may be going on. He puts the knife back where it belongs and decides to continue to look for his keys. He goes back into his room still furious but also nervous, sad, and scared all at the same time. As he walks into his bedroom to continue the search for his keys, he think he hears people talking in the living room. He quickly gets the feeling of butterflies back in his stomach as he races to the kitchen to grab the biggest butcher knife he owns. He slowly creeps around the corner and he glances into the living room where he thinks he sees someone hiding behind his couch, he tip toes up to the couch to surprisingly see his ex-girlfriend sitting there. He stares at her for a second just in awe, as she does the same thing to him. He quickly asks what she is doing the and she is still too stunned to speak, she then tells him she just came to return his house key and she did not want to have to speak to him. He then asks her if she has seen his keys she tells him yes. He is stunned he is so happy and relieved as he asks where they are and she tells him she took them by accident and came to return his house and to return his keys which she did not mean to take. He is so relieved and happy that he can finally get on with his life.

[CE] Child Morality in Africa

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2011/09/201191519293885980.html

                 I think it is very good that the deaths of children under the age of five in Africa has gone down since the last decade. The number of deaths has gone from 12 million to 7.6 million from 1999 to 2010. More than 12,000 children are being saved per day with Africa's new heath care over the last decade. This is very good news for Africa and the rest of the world that cares about young children's lives.

There have been improvements in nutrition and the water is much cleaner then it was in the past when there was a high number in deaths. They will not meet the goal they set back in 2000 to reduce the deaths by over 2/3 in 2015 but this is still great news, but more money is still needed for that goal. The deaths have declined twice as much in this past decade and it showing great progress for humans in Africa and around the world. Almost half the deaths in the world of children under five came almost all in Africa, but this is still great news.

[FREE] School

I have never really liked or done well in school ever since I started in Kindergarten. I even remember right after my first day of Kindergarten I asked my mom and dad if I had to go to school again the next day, I was very upset when they said that I had to go back to school the next day. I remember really wanting to start school, but when it came down to it, I hated school, it was like the worst place on Earth, you had to do work and get up early in the morning and stay there all day against my will. The one thing I did really like was my teacher in kindergarten; I had her for two long years because at the end of kindergarten I was told it would be best if I repeated the grade one more time because I did not have the social skills I needed to move on. Through the rest of my time at Edison Elementary School I really did enjoy it; I had so much fun playing football or kickball at recess with all my friends and we always new each other and very rarely did some of the kids not get along with others in their grade.                                                                                               School was great until I got to Lincoln Middle School, once I got there I hated school again because I did not know everyone and school was very hard. It felt like we had so much homework, even though it was not that much, but I was working for hours at night and I had no clue what I was doing at times. School was terrible at Lincoln, but when I got to Alameda High School it was like I was back at elementary school. I have really enjoyed my time at AHS so far.

Rsponse post: words I don't know

My writing goal is to understand what my whole class is writing because I hate coming up to a word I don't know.

This is from Nick’s blog http://tronwolf.blogspot.com/ and I really do feel the same way when I read other people’s writing sometimes. I really hate coming to a word and having no clue at all what its meaning is. I feel like part of this happening is just me having difficulties paying attention but I also need to make my personal vocabulary a little better such as reading from other texts, such as a newspaper or magazines. I feel I do not read as much as some of the better students in class or even as much as I should at my age and grade level, but I really need to work on my reader and my personal vocabulary. It also makes me very upset when I am reading in front of the class and I come to a word I am not sure of and I am afraid to say it because I don’t want to mess up the word and feel embarrassed because I don’t want to mess it up and feel stupid in front of the whole class.

For example, I can remember in the fifth grade the teacher would pick a student to read a paragraph and for them to pick another student to read a paragraph and so on. One word in the paragraph I was selected to read was; consciousness and I had no clue how to pronounce it  or what it meant. I was so embarrassed to read this word and also I was to embarrassed to ask what it meant. Later that night I looked up the word, so I would know for next I came across this tough word. 

Current Event

I think all this extra is good but it is not that needed. People are taking all these terrorists  attacks way too seriously, I think it is good that people realize that we need to be safe and step up our security, but we should have all ways had hard security none of theses attacks would have occurred if we had good security. Also it is not necessary for people to racially profile people by seeing then wearing something such as clothing or a hat and just be scared as if they are going to hurt you or something like that. I also think it is unnecessary for people in this video say they think the terrorists will try to attack on the 10th anniversary of 9/11, I do not think people would try to do that because there is no need for them to try to attack us again for no good reason. I also think that people that took two new people in the United States are just very stupid, why would you take random people to jail for question just because of how they look or what they are wearing?

The people that took them to jail should be fired from their jobs, that is such a stupid thing to do for two new people to the U.S.A. That may be one of the dumbest things I have ever heard why on Earth are they so prepared for another big attack, 9/11 was a very tragic event but I don’t think anything like that will happen again, but that’s just my opinion.

[FREE] Football

    Ever since I was young I have always loved to play football and watch the Oakland Raiders play. I have always been a huge fan of the Raiders since I was going to games with my dad in the late 1990’s and the early 2000’s when they returned to Oakland from Los Angeles. I remember how they were so good when we used to go to games but now they can be very hard to watch but I remember just loving going to games but know it is a struggle to watch them play sometimes but they were so good. I remember when Rich Gannon would throw touchdowns to Tim Brown and Jerry Rice all day and they just never seemed to lose except when it mattered: the playoffs.

I remember when the Ravens came to Oakland and just killed the Raiders in the game that would send the winner to the Super Bowl. The next year in 2001 when they had to travel to a snowy New England to take on the Patriots, they did everything thing right to win the game but the referees just took it right out of their hands. Then of course the magical year of 2002 when they actually made it to the Super Bowl. They just tore up the rest of the NFL on their to the Super Bowl,  but when they met their former coach in the big game it was no match it was one of the worst games I have ever seen they just got killed and it was no match at at all, it was very upsetting.

All About Me

Hello, my name is Jackson Tracy and I live in Alameda, Ca, I was born on October 11th 1995 at John Muir Hospital in Walnut Creek. I moved to Alameda when I was 4 years old from Moraga, Ca. While I have been in Alameda I have attended Edison Elementary and Lincoln Middle School, I really liked both schools and I had a lot of fun throughout even though I had horrible grades while at Lincoln. While I was at Lincoln I never really focused on school like I should have, I didn’t really get some of the work but I never bothered to ask any questions to help myself. It wasn’t really until eighth grade when I realized I better get it together or I won’t walk the stage with my class, but even then when I really tried hard to focus I couldn’t, I would always find my self staring off into space and missing important information in class. I told my mom and she suggested we get me checked out for ADD or maybe some other deficit. When went through a long annoying process of going to the doctor and also taking tests at school and also countless school meetings with teachers and my parents. After about a month of testing two weeks before the end of school I found out that I had ADHD and that I could take medication that would help me focus. Just as we found this out I found out I was going to graduate and I was so excited.

    Since I was young I have always loved sports, I love to play baseball and football weather it’s in a league or just with my friends, I love sports. I have played baseball every year of my life since I was four years old and I have never gotten tried of it and I look to keep playing if I can continue. I only did play one year of football in a league but it was very fun and we won the championship, but I could not play the next year because I had bad grades and did not have time for that. I am a very big fan of the Oakland Raiders and the San Francisco Giants, I have never been happier than when the Giants won the World Series, it was just such a great moment in my life. I am very excited for the upcoming football season and going to Raider games, I have been going since I could walk with my dad who had season tickets. My dad no longer has season tickets but we still go to as many games as we can each season and we both love going. I really love sports and they are a huge part of my life, I love to play almost every sport just not in a league. As you can see from me, I have struggled in school, but I am trying my best know and love sports and want to continue to play and watch them.