TJ's work

How properly could someone assess your life by taking a glance at the clothes in your closet? Can these garments tell the significant events of your life? Do they say when you got married, had a baby, graduated from college, got promoted in your job, retired, had surgery, or became a grandparent? The answer is no. Clothes, shoes, and hats are impermanent and tell us little. From a biological perspective, our skin and its color suffers the same fate. It comes in many varieties, but tells us almost nothing about our underlying differences. Just because a man is white does not mean that he gets special treatment from others of his race in the professional community, nor does it mean that he has any type of non-good feeling about another race based solely upon the others skin color. Same goes for a man whose black, just because you’re dark skinned doesn’t mean you deserve any extra respect then the average Joe……..your ANCESTORS went through hard times, NOT YOU!!!! Judgment of others while looking through the racial lens of life is completely ignorant, there’s no doubt about that. And if you heard what I heard during the course of a regular school day, you would want to voice your own opinion on it as well.

Well seeing as how I am starving for some food at the moment, I thought I would blog about one of my all time favorite dishes my grandma makes me, and in the process give you the recipe, as told to me by my grandmother herself. Its called the sourdough pizza melt and its to DIE FOR. This Pizza Melt is a different way to grill up some pizza heaven. If you are a bread baker you can always whip up some of your own sourdough bread. I cheated and bought the daily discount bread from the bakery. $1.45 for a loaf of heavy bakery bread is a steal and I would be lying if I told you I always bake my own bread. So pick the bread your heart desires and move on to the fun part.

The Sour Dough Pizza Melt

butter or margarine
a pack of pepperoni slices. (very durable can last up to 4 months)
shredded cheese ( stock up on shredded cheese when it is on sale and throw it in the freezer.)
1/2 cup of pizza sauce. (any old brand will be just fine)
sourdough bread slices (explained above)
olives — optional (love them)

Heat a grill on the stove top to medium- medium/high heat. Butter one side of each slice of sour dough bread. Coat one of the slice’s with the pizza sauce, then layer it with cheese, then pepperoni and finally olives. Then top the other with the remaining slice of bread and grill until golden to golden brown depending on your preference. Turn and repeat on the opposite side of the melt. Enjoy with a cold glass of soda and a bag of your favorite chips.

A firm foundation is always required to build anything.

My childhood home, the first house I ever lived in as a child has been torn down. I have known for a while that the house was in bad shape, but I still loved it, and cherished it as the house that help make me who I am today. About 8 years back we sold the house to a loner type man.
This person then turned around and sold the house. Afterwards, there was a renter in the home and he died and the city of san mateo put up a notice that the house was unsafe.
Every few weeks we would drive by and see what progress had been made. As I watched the house come down, it became painfully clear just what bad shape the house frame and foundation was in. I could see clearly the rotten wood of the frame and a crumbling foundation. The water table is very high and the house was built just a few feet from a creek with only a small crawl space under. The house had sunk into the soft moist ground. None of the homes in this area have basements because of the water table.
When my dad was putting a new siding on the house a few years back, a solid place for a nail was hard to find. The frame was rotten as well as the sunken foundation, just a complete mess.
Now, as I drive by my beloved first home, there is an empty lot with trees. The yard always had beautiful trees and the little creek is beautiful. It is hard to even see where the foundation was. It really is a beautiful looking lot. I still see a home and a family but others see an empty lot next to a creek. This was my earthly home. I have a new home in life and mind, with family and friends and motivations.
Build your house on a solid foundation, on the rock not the sand, whether it be made out of wood or imagination.

Who you surround yourself with is the foundation for your life. Our frames should be made with love, loyalty, and joy. Don’t build your house on the sand.

I have a story to tell. Earlier today I was sitting and thinking about what topic I might possibly be willing to blog about. I racked my brain for ideas until it started to hurt. What could I come up with to write about? That’s when I overheard a few peers talking about graduation and who is and isn’t getting a diploma, and how low a quality of life someone will have without “education”. “Well,” I thought, “I can agree with that to an extent”. But, let me tell you something a wise man once told me, “An education isn’t how much you have committed to memory, or even how much you know. It’s being able to differentiate between what you know and what you don’t, education is a never ending discovery of ignorance, it’s growth, it’s emotion, and to many people education is life itself, and that’s an admirable thing, but its important to remind yourself that in all honesty, nothing worth knowing can be taught”. Now, the person who told me this happens to be a close friend of mine who until about 4 months ago attended Rancho Cotate, then was involuntarily transferred to El Camino where he was forced to earn his diploma in an anything but traditional fashion, so he may be a bit biased but I liked what he had to say nonetheless. Anyways, back to today’s events. So as this conversation unfolds in front of me, it gets me thinking, how come just because someone didn’t do it the conventional way means that they’re destined for failure in life, what gives anyone a right to judge another person in that manner….NO ONE HAS THAT RIGHT! What? Because 20 kids each year don’t live up to society’s standards they are automatically tagged as failures, written off as McDonalds cashiers or janitors, the bottom feeders that do jobs that everyone thinks they’re too good for, the jobs that basically no one wants. To be honest the graduation part of this isn’t what upsets me, because I’m nearly positive that statistics show a diploma raises quality of life way higher, as does a college degree and so on and so forth. What makes me mad is peoples opinions and thought processes, they actually baffle me to tell you the truth because the things that come out of some peoples mouths are mind boggling, and I’ll leave it at that.

Have you ever been to another schools prom? I have never been to a Prom, this year is my senior year so I’m going go out with a bang. I have made plans to go to three proms this year. I am going to Windsor High School’s prom, Rancho Cotati’s prom, and St. Vincent’s prom. I am able to afford this because for two of the proms I am not paying for anything. I am only paying for my prom. The girls I am taking are taking care of every thing. I am so excited. For one prom I am taking a party bus, the other two I am taking a limo. I already have after parties planned now all we need is the prom it self to come and every thing will be complete.

 This is my fourth year at rancho, most rumors are all false. There are rarely fights. I have yet to see a fight all year at the Ranch. We as a school have more AP classes, advanced placement classes, than Sonoma Valley High School. We have an amazing Auto Body and Detail class where we learn how to weld fix any kind of exterior damage, and as well we learn how to use every day tools. Our Wood Working class has a very prestigious amount of projects that go through the Sonoma County Fair and almost always take first, I my self have done so. Our School has amazing school sports programs with and amazing school spirit to back up there teams. I went to every football game this season and I guarantee that we had more student attendance at both home and away games. We as students support all our school sports.  Last year we had students achieve full ride to colleges such and Harvard and other school around the area. 

 Yes Rancho may have flaws but, no more than any other school. My girl friend at Piner has told me about there being “drive bys” monthly! I myself have been to party with rancho students all around but I have been to other parties with people from schools such as Montgomery and all the people there were doing intense drugs such as cocaine and crystal meth. Not many kids that I know at Ranch do that hard core of drugs. Yes many kids smoke, and yes a lot of the time it is marijuana, but let’s face it, I know or a fact that more Analy student smoke marijuana.

 Rancho Cotate academics and sports have suffered severely for student out sourcing. This must be stopped please do not out source your children to other schools.

Have you see what has happened in Wall Street? Things went from the best they have ever been to the second worse crash in the stock market ever. President Bush has led us into a horrid time. We need to change the way we live. We need to change the way we get our energy. We need to create more jobs. And this is how we the people oh the United States of America will prove to the world, we are the best country.

            First off, Taxes are a huge issue with the economy crisis; since Bush has sent us into a deadly spiral, I believe we can pull out of this and be better that we were before. I Promise Tax break for the entire middle class. And for the people who make more that $250,000 a year will get a tax increase from 15% to 20%; which is not that bad because if they are making that much money to begin with, I’m sure they can afford the small 5% increase. Why should the citizens pay taxes any ways, if it’s for a cause we don’t believe in? Much like the Jews refused to pay taxes to Caesar, to because the taxation did not benefit them (Mathew @:19-21) At last I purpose an energy rebate to which we can use to get through this harsh time.

            In order to change our country is going into a revolution, we need to invest in new types of energy and means of travel. So we need to invest in new and more “green” ways to get energy. We need to invest in types of energy like solar, wind, geothermal, and even nuclear energy. The best thing about the new types of energy is it will create a number of jobs I can’t even count to. And to add to creating more jobs, we should invest our transportation systems. We need to repair railroads and make them for public use: for long and short distances. As a result, more jobs in America, makes us a strongest, most formidable country in the world

            Secondly the crisis that has happened in Wall Street, We need to jump start our economy. As a result we need to unfortunately bail out all the major banks and complaints that have put them selves to bankruptcy so this bail out will cost 700 billion dollars since we the tax payers are paying for this bail out we deserve a 90 day on for closers so people that have been hurt by the crisis can recover.  Now if we do this it will help us get back on top and make us the best most invincible.  re paying for this bail out we deserve a 90 day on for closers so people that have been hurt by the crisis can recover.  Now if we do this it will help us get back on top and make us the best most invincible country in the world, far better than any adversary.

            Lastly what our country needs, is change to become the best country in the world. Tax breaks and more high paying jobs will push us to strive for the American dream and that my friends will make us the best country in the world.

            We see bias in our news every day, but do you realize it? You may not because you watch one certain broadcast every day, and you hear one side of a story every day, but really it is usually tilted to one side or another. The most un-bias new source to me is very boring, PBS’s News Hour is very dry and dull but at least there is no bias. Whereas Fox News is very conservative and CNN is very liberal. But people watch these stations because the grab you, they entice you, the make you hang on your seat through each story but grabbing to your interests. Unfortunately these are the stations that every one watches. Is this right? No, bias media is a very scary thing because when the media starts to control our country, there really is no say in what happens. When the media decides to only show one candidate, we only see their views, and we only vote for that person, is that right? You make the decision by choosing a REAL un-bias news resource even if it is dry and boring there is no tilt to one side.

On this day in 1968, “Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood” debuted. This popular children’s television show shared many lessons with its viewers. If you could create your own television show for kids, what type of show would you have and what would the show be called? I would start a game show where people have to compete against there own spouses. It would be the ultimate test for a couple… couples would compete in not only physical but mental challenges too. It would be like a televised academic decathlon for couples. I would call it the Couple Dual!