Week 4 – The revision process

Howdy everyone!

This week was spent to revise and edit my first paper.  Most of my editing was grammatical and sentence structures.  When I am gathering my thoughts and ideas, I tend to put grammar on the back burner.  I tend to create run on sentences sometimes too.  A comma can be very important sometimes!!  I also corrected some of my work citing to do it correctly.  I usually notice people’s grammatical mistakes in their own writings, more than I do my own, so  I know the corrections I made will hopefully get me a better grade on the assignment.  As a musician, and a songwriter, I am never happy with a final product.  I always think it can be better, and it probably always can.  There comes a point when you have to say enough is enough!!

On a side note, I wanted to break my iMac in half because I was having some major issues with the .RTF and .DOC format compatibility.  I’m not sure where I went wrong, but I’m hoping I solved the problem.  I’m usually awesome with computers, but two aspirins later, the headache finally went away.

I hope everyone is happy with their first essay!!

– Chris

Peer Review

I think we can all easily forget one of our best sources these days, and that is our peers.  Our peers can offer a different set of eyes or ears, to point out something you might have overlooked or missed while doing something.  They can also play the devil’s advocate when need be.  I think it was a great idea to do this.  I don’t think I’ve ever been able to read other classmates papers in the past.  We would always just write them and turn them in.  I feel like I got some pretty good feedback on my piece and have a better idea of what to touch up a bit.  As for a stand out piece, I thought Nicholas Russell did a really nice job on “Dr Quinn. Medicine Woman”.  You could see his enthusiasm of the show lifting off the paper.

As for revising my paper, I think it is important to try to paint a better picture of the time period, what more of the people were like, setting, etc.  I think it will be fairly easy to do.

With that said…  It’s time for Sunday  Brunch!!!

– Chris

My first essay

I have decided that I am going to go the TV show route.  I am going to watch The Rifleman.  I chose this because it was a show I would watch when I was little with my Dad.  I haven’t watched it in years, and would love to again.  I mentioned the assignment to him, and he started talking about one of his favorite episodes.  I haven’t been able to find it yet, but am looking diligently.  He doesn’t know the name of the episode, so I have just been reading episode descriptions to try to find it.  There were a lot of episodes, so it’s a difficult task!!

The first source I am planning to use is a fan site that has a community of people that really enjoy the show.  I think other peoples opinion of the show will help me possibly see it from a different perspective other than my own.

http://www.riflemansrifle.com/

The second source I am going to use is Wikipedia.  It has an accurate list of the episodes, the dates of the show, and all the characters and information about them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rifleman

I have always been a fan of the Internet movie database when trying to find out something about a TV Series or a film, so I knew immediately I would use it.  I also have a friend with an industry login account, that can sometimes provide more information from the website that isn’t available to just anyone.  I believe this is definitely a trustworthy source.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051308/

I am going to use therifleman.net because it looks to provide information about the production company that put on the show to begin with, and has a really good rundown on the programs history.

http://www.therifleman.net/

Lastly, I am going to use answers.com – It is kind of setup like a Wikipedia page just for the series.  I think this will be a good way to really crack down on bits of information that are more detailed than other sources provide.

http://www.answers.com/topic/the-rifleman

– I’m glad that I like these types of shows.  I could see how it would be hard for some people to get into this show this day and age, because it is definitely a bit dated, compared to the technology we have to make film today.  It’s also in black and white.  I have friends that refuse to watch anything in black and white!!  I don’t understand that.  But anyway, I think I have found the episodes I want to watch, minus the one my Dad said was his favorite.  Hopefully I can find it online.  Worst case scenario, I’ll go pick up the DVD set tomorrow and get rolling.  I’ve already discovered in my search that they are planning on remaking the series as of 2011.  Usually these things ruin the original, but here is to wishful thinking!!

Good luck everyone on your first essay paper!  I put a photo of the main character below.

– Chris

Go west young man, go west.

Hi there everyone!!

My name is Chris and I am 26 years old.  I am a musician and have been lucky enough to travel the country to perform music.  I play guitar and piano as well as sing.  I have always had a passion to pursue a career in law enforcement, so I figured I could take classes online as well as play some Rock N Roll shows at the same time, in case the whole music thing doesn’t work out.

I am really looking forward to diving in to this course.  When I read over the syllabus, I got excited that the theme for the course was the Wild West.  I’ve always felt that I was born in the wrong century.  I think I would have faired well in the 19th century as a cowboy but C’est la vie!  I think life would have been more enjoyable in a simpler time like the Wild West, a time with no Twitter, Facebook, or even blogs ;).  I grew up watching westerns with my Father, so I am definitely excited to re-visit those days.

As a side note, the name of my blog “I miss Billy the Kid” comes from a lyric in a country song by an artist named Billy Dean who has had a successful career.  The song is called “Billy the Kid” and I thought it was appropriate for the western theme of this course.  I’m not a huge country music fan, but Billy was a family friend, and he performed with my Father at my Grandfather’s funeral in the mid-90’s.  I’ve attached the video for the song if you care to watch/listen.  The actual song doesn’t start until about 20 seconds into the video.

As for being eLearning ready, I think I will be fine.  I am really handy with the Internet and computers, even though I have a love/hate relationship with technology.  Coming to terms with actually taking college classes on the Internet is probably going to be my biggest weakness.  I took English 101 in 2003, nearly nine years ago, so I am a little concerned.  I couldn’t cite a source if my life depended on it right now, but I hope that will change.  I scored a 7/7 on the study habits portion, and a 13/13 on the technology portion on the readiness quiz, so I definitely believe the cowboy in me will walk into the sunset at the end of this course.

I do have one question for Professor Taylor…  What is your favorite western film??

I wish everyone luck in the course, I think it’s going to be a fun one!

– Chris