i like stories…

Well, these past couple of days we’ve been watching a movie called “October Sky” in English class. The story is pretty interesting and the movie is based on the book Rocket Boys by Homer Hickam. We read this book for summer reading. It is Hickam’s memoir of his “rocket boy” days in the mining town Coalwood, where he and his friends, inspired by the Russians’ Sputnik and the U.S. efforts in space, built their own rockets and made it to the National Science Fair. They overcame many difficulties, from the limited resources of a small mining town, the ridicule of many townspeople, building rockets from scratch, and learning advanced math and science on their own. Luckily, they had a few valuable mentors and allies, and along the way, gathered overwhelming support from the townspeople, even when Coalwood hit uncertain times in the midst of strained relations between labor union and company. Told in understated but descriptive narrative, both the movie and book paint the story of a dream.

This was one of the few summer reading books that I actually wanted to finish reading, even in tempting laziness of summer vacation.

Photoshop!

I have been attempting to use photoshop recently to edit pictures! Here are two pictures that I made. The first came from a ferris wheel in Japan and a picture of the moon. The second came from a picture of a Haleakala sunrise and a picture from National Geographic of an ancient Greek structure, so it’s not entirely my work, but I think it looks cool. The third came from the sunrise pic and the Guilin mountains/hills in southern China. Please comment/criticize ^_^, because I don’t really know how to use photoshop that well

Eventually, I’ll make an Art page with drawings/paintings, edited images, and miscellaneous artwork! Another project for the summer!

Hmmm…maybe I should lighten up the clouds? It looks a little gloomy…