My Escape from Slavery :: Personal Narrative, Autobiographical Essay

I live on a car lot. My front yard is gravel and asphalt with intermittent splotches of eternally black oil unyielding to any cleaning agent natural or otherwise. Our house is built on the lot right beside iron train tracks. And of course there is the constant image of old cars lined up in rows, not junky just old. It's embarrassing to live under these conditions, but I wouldn't change the situation at all. My family moved onto the car lot when I was in seventh grade. My father had been in the used car business for only about five years. As an adult my father had switched jobs more often than most middle class parents are accustomed. Before taking on the title of a car salesman, he had held a well-paying state department position in which he trained the unemployed so they could find work. However, he claims that by the end his job had become more about paper work and less about people. You see, my dad is a businessman, or at least prides himself as one. People are his game. He saw the car business as the perfect profession to utilize his gifts that were so shamefully being wasted at his old job. Those first years of his being a car salesman, however, I almost never saw my dad. I would get up and be off to school before he awoke, and I would be asleep or at least in bed before he was able to drag his exhausted and overworked body in the front door and collapse in the bed. Often he would be unable to eat dinner until he slept for a couple hours. I can still remember a few times seeing him sitting on the couch at 2 o'clock in the morning in his pajamas eating cottage cheese and peaches and watching Headline News. Needless to say, my father grew tired of living such an existence. Sure, he was supporting his family, but I'm certain he felt horrible about his lack of time with his children. This case is of course what led to my father's suggestion that we move into the building next to his office on the lot. This "house" was actually just another office building with a kitchen. Furthermore this car lot had been erected in the same location as all the other dealerships in our community: downtown.

The Evolution of Skin Tanning Essay -- Sociology Essays Research Paper

The Evolution of Skin Tanning One of Catherine’s insatiable obsessions in Ernest Hemingway’s The Garden of Eden is to darken her skin color. She accomplishes this by sun tanning at every opportunity possible, and naturally, her skin turns many shades darker. Catherine’s skin tanning fixation at the time the story takes place coincides with the premiere of skin tanning as a stylish and chic fashionable pursuit. Traditionally, tanned skin was undesirable to the public. Prior to the industrial revolution, most manual labor was done outside under the sun where such constant exposure resulted in darker skin. Consequently, because manual labor was a staple of the lower classes, tanned skinned also became associated with the destitute and unprosperous (BBC). Not only was dark skin undesirable, but people craved for pale skin. The relaxed elite wanted to show that they stayed indoors because of the needlessness to be outside in the sun doing any type of work of their own. Thus, pale skin became linked with the wealthy and high class (The Tanning Taboo). This lead to practices by the elite such as covering most of their body when they went swimming and carrying around parasols to shade themselves from the sun (Sun and Clouds). The desire for paleness dates all the way back to the ancient Greeks and Romans, who would use lead paints and chalk to make their faces white and colorless as possibl e (Tanning). In 18th century France and Elizabethan England, royalty would go to such lengths as powdering their faces with toxins to get a pale hue on their faces (The Tanning Taboo). Until the 20th century, nobody desired bronzed skin in Europe or America. A few events lead to the change in the public’s feelings toward tanned ski... ...f Tanning† California Tan Heliotherapy. 14 November 2002. http://www.californiatan.com/tanbasic/history_of_tan.ehtm - A website about tanning history from the 1920s to present. Rutherford, Kim. â€Å"The Tanning Taboo† September 2001. The Nemours Foundation. 14 November 2002. - The Nemours Foundation’s site aimed at informing kids about sun safety. â€Å"Sun and Clouds - The Sun in History† The Chemical Heritage Foundation. 14 November 2002. http://www.chemheritage.org/EducationalServices/pharm/chemo/readings/tsih.htm> - The Chemical Heritage Foundation’s site about the human/sun relationship. â€Å"Tanning† Cool Nurse. 14 November 2002. < http://www.coolnurse.com/tanning.htm> ‑ The Cool Nurse website about safe tanning that also reveals the development of the tan.

How Community based schools work :: essays papers

How Community based schools work Community schools are partnerships between public and private organizations. The school becomes a hub for the community. These schools not only teach students but also provide access to services families needs. â€Å"It’s integration of academics and services leads to improved student learning, stronger families and healthier communities† (Blank, Heifets, Shah, & Nissani, 2004, p. 155). Community based schools use partnerships to build community consensus and carryout programs that would normally not be available to the community. For example, community schools provide a clothing closet, emergency food, counseling, and limited health care for families (Blank et al., 2004). In contrast, public schools work towards educating students, provide services such as school lunch programs, access to a school nurse and special education programs. To illustrate the differences between Community Based Schools and Public Schools, I will use St Paul, Minnesota and Harford County, Maryland as an example. Saint Paul, Minnesota currently has three community base schools. In 2001, the total student enrollment in St. Paul, Minnesota was 45,011 (The Minneapolis Foundation, 2005). The demographic break down is as follows. St. Paul, Minnesota is as follows: 901 American Indian/Alaskan Native, 13,953 Asian/Pacific Islander, 10,802 African American, 14,854 Caucasian, and 4,501 Hispanic. Note: the Minneapolis Foundation cited demographics as a percentage. These percentages were converted to whole numbers for comparison purpose. There were 40,200 pupils enrollment in Harford County public schools for 2004 (Maryland Report Card, Harford County 2004). The demographic breakdown in Harford County public schools is as follows: 215 American Indian/Alaskan Native, 925 Asian/Pacific Islander, 6,571 African American, 31,402 Caucasian and 1,087 Hispanic (Maryland Report Card, Harford County 2004). Note: since schools rarely give individual demographic numbers, county public school demographics were used. While the fiscal years are different, the student population is comparable in size. â€Å"The demographic population of community schools are much the same as public schools since community schools are enhanced public schools and do not turn any students away based on ability† (Official, Coalition for Community schools, personal communication, April 26, 2005). Community schools are funded in several ways. Many community schools receive grants from philanthropic organization such as Carnegie Corp., Charles Stewart Mott foundation, and Knowledge Works to name a few. Additional funding is provided by the Department of Education. On average, the department gives schools $250,000 in funds to support the No Child Left behind (NCLB) act.

A Preview Of The Twentieth Century Essay

History tells us so much that the essence of humanity would be of a void nature without it. We can safely say that history is the collective experience of humanity itself. Thus, a distortion made upon history is irreverence to our collective experience. If one distorts history, he/she changes humanity’s life story. There is a need to preserve history as it happened. From history we learn lessons and avoid doing things that lead us to our own destruction. Take for example the two world wars that happened, if a third world war happens, then we, humanity, did not learn and care at all about our own history. History distortions commonly happen in the ideological and political arena. These distortions kill human lives. Conflicts that happen in the Europe and the Middle East as well as in America are caused by differences on the way people view religion and faith. Infamous of these are bombings caused by Muslim fundamentalists. Hence, history should be taught as it happened. History should be taught with clarity and vividness. People are intelligent enough to discern between the good and bad events that happened. Respect given for each other’s perspective and ideology should be encouraged to avoid conflicts. An integration of history arriving at the closest description of events as they happen should be done taking into consideration the differences in the religious and political beliefs of different races. Research should be done in order to correct the mistakes made on writing history. Yet, the most important of these is respect. If people cannot agree on a particular issue of history, then their only option is to respect its other’s views. There is no other alternative, they must respect each other. History is what we are. If we distort our perception of history, we change our very lives’ meaning.

Loneliness in Of Mice And Men Essay

John Steinbeck wrote Of Mice And Men in 1937. The story is about two men called George and Lennie. They travelled together from ranch to ranch looking for a job. Lennie is a big and he is dumb. They had travelled together for a long time. The story Of Mice and Men is set in 1930s America. At this time there was a depression in America. Unemployment was high, so people would move from ranch to ranch looking for work. Candy, Crooks and Curleys Wife are the loneliest people on the ranch. Curley’s wife is possibly the loneliest of the characters, as she is the only woman on the ranch and the men are all afraid to talk to her. This shows she must have a really lonely life. Curley’s wife only flirts with the workers because it is the only way she knows to get her attention. The reason Curleys wife wanted to speak to Lennie in chapter five is that she doesn’t have anyone to talk to. She tells Lennie this, saying â€Å"You can talk to people, but I can’t talk to nobody but Curley. Else he gets mad. How’d you like not to talk to anybody† Candy is an old man with only one arm. He had an old dog but he let Carlson kill it. Candy was very attached to his old dog, as he had been with the dog since it was a pup, he was his only friend. He feels guilty that he let a stranger kill it. Candy is afraid that he will be sacked when he is no longer any use. He knows that he will have nowhere to go when he gets fired, so when he hears George and Lennie talking about getting their own place, asks them to take him with them, and offers them enough money so that at the end of the month they will be able to afford to buy the place. After his dog’s death, Candy seems desperate to leave the ranch. To make George and Lennie sure that he wants the place he tells them â€Å"I will make a will and leave my share to you guys in case I kick off, because I ain’t got no relatives nor nothing†. Crooks is a black man with a crooked back. He is the only black man on the ranch and is not allowed in the bunkroom because of his colour. Crooks knows that black people are thought of as such, as when Curleys wife tells him that if he tells the boss to ban her from the barn she would get him hung, he simply replies yes mamma. Crooks spends his time alone reading and is a fairly knowledgeable person, as he owns a copy of the California civil code for 1905. He also plays horseshoes until dark, but is not allowed into the bunkhouse to play cards, as the others claim he stinks. He is nasty to Lennie at first, as he thought Lennie shouldn’t be in his room, as he is banned from the bunkhouse. When he finds out Lennie is harmless however, he lets him stay for some company. He hasn’t really spoken to anyone for a long time, and is eager for Lennie’s company. He shows this when he claims books ain’t no good. A guy needs somebody to be near him and à ¯Ã‚ ¿Ã‚ ½ a guy goes nits if he ain’t got anybody. He wants to join in with George, Lennie and Candy to get the place as he is discriminated against at the ranch. I don’t think loneliness is a problem to George and Lennie, as, like Lennie loves saying to George, I’ve got you to look after me, and you got me to look after you George says about ranchers that travel alone, guys like us, that work on ranches, are the loneliest guys in the world. They got no family, they don’t belong no place’s One of the things that binds George and Lennie together is that they share a common dream, to buy their own land, and live off of the fatta the land The fact that they travel together makes them believe that one day they will really get enough money together to do this, and they nearly had the chance. The reason loneliness was such a problem in 1930s America is that no one ever settled anywhere long enough to make any ties or get to know anyone.

A Comparative Study of Two Shampoo Brands Based on General Consumer-Related Qualities

A blind comparison of two brand-name shampoos was performed using two selected subjects that have been pre-determined to be willing to participate in the study.   The brand-name shampoos included in this investigation were ClairolTM Herbal Essences and Tresemmà © TM.Each shampoo brand was used daily by the participant for an entire week.   Overall evaluation of each shampoo brand was performed through the completion of a questionnaire.Shampoo quality scores were determined to be higher for Clairol TM Herbal Essences than for Tresemmà © TM.   In addition, the participants’ response rate to the Clairol TM was faster than Tresemmà ©TM, suggesting the Clairol TM Herbal Essences is a better shampoo brand.IntroductionHair quality and appearance has long been considered as a major factor in personal appearance.   In both men and women, several aspects of hair maintenance are given substantial attention, including style, color, shampoo, conditioner, treatments and accessori es such as gels, spritzes and sprays.There is a continuous increase in the number of brands of shampoos, and the consumer is generally overwhelmed and confused with which brand or even type of shampoo would be most beneficial to their personal hair care needs.Such settings warrant the comparative study of specific brands and types of shampoos for the benefit and understanding of the public consumer (Rapaport, 1981; Rigopoulous et al., 2007).This study aims to compare two shampoo brands that are commonly found in the local pharmacy or grocery, and determine which brand provides a greater hair improvement as well as better hair maintenance.Materials and methodsTwo brand-name shampoos were selected for inclusion in this comparative investigation:   Clairol TM Herbal Essences and Tresemmà © TM.   Two subjects who previously gave their consent to participate in this investigation were given an unlabeled bottle of shampoo that contained either Clairol TM Herbal Essences or Tresemmà ©TM.Such blind setting was designed to avoid bias among the participants.   The subjects were asked to complete a questionnaire (Appendix A) upon handing out the shampoo, and were also asked to use the shampoo daily for an entire week.At the end of the week, the participants were asked to complete a second questionnaire (Appendix B).   Each question had an equivalent score of 10 points and the total score of 100 points can be calculated for each brand of shampoo.ResultsEvaluation of responses of each participant was evaluated and the total score was determined for each brand-name shampoo.   Clairol TM Herbal Essences received a higher total score than Tresemmà ©TM, suggesting that Clairol TM Herbal Essences was a better brand-name shampoo to the consumer based on the shampoo qualitites enumerated in the questionnaire.It was also determined that ClairolTM Herbal Essences showed a faster improvement rate than Tresemmà ©TM, wherein the participants hair quality improved upon on e application of the shampoo.DiscussionHair maintenance has been an important factor in the personal hygiene of every individual (Trueb and the Swiss Trichology Study Group, 2001).   Several factors have been determined to play key roles in successful hair maintenance, including haircuts and styling, washing and conditioning, as well as hair dying and curling (Trueb, 2007).There are currently a huge number of shampoo brands out in the market, and the consumer is generally overwhelmed and confused in terms of choice of the best brand for their personal use.   This study aimed to compare two brands of shampoos that are commonly sold at local pharmacies and groceries.Using a blind study of brand-name shampoos and two participants, we were able to compare the qualities of Clairol TM Herbal Essences and Tresemmà ©TM, including consumer satisfaction, sudsing and hair softness.It has been shown that ClairolTM Herbal Essences remains to be a consumer’s choice, based on the total overall score shown in the evaluation of the questionnaire completed by the participants after one week of usage of the shampoo.This study has also shows that it is possible to compare a specific brand of shampoo with another brand using a short-term exposure treatment.   However, the study also shows some limitations because the study population is very small and the treatment time was too short.This investigative tool may serve as a model for future large-scale and prolonged-treatment investigations.ReferencesRapaport M (1981):   A randomized, controlled clinical trial of four anti-dandruff shampoos.   J. Int. Med. Res. 9(2):152-6.Rigopoulos D, Gregoriou S, Kontochristopoulos G, Ifantides A, Katsambas A.Mycoses (2007): Flutrimazole shampoo 1% versus ketoconazole shampoo 2% in the treatment of pityriasis versicolor. A randomised double-blind comparative trial. Mycoses   50(3):193-5.Trà ¼eb RM (2007):   Shampoos: ingredients, efficacy and adverse effects.   J. Dtsch. D ermatol. Ges. 5(5):356-65.Trà ¼eb RM and the Swiss Trichology Study Group (2001):   The value of hair cosmetics and pharmaceuticals.   Dermatology  Ã‚   202(4):275-82.

Is “Sredni Vashtar” a Horror Short Story? Essay

â€Å"Sredni Vashtar† Takes a close look into the life and interactions of and between Conradin; his cousin and mentor, Mrs. de Ropp and Conradin’s Ferret and God: Sredni Vashtar. It can be described as a horror story because of its character’s description, themes and setting. It shows the religious downfall of the protagonist, the death of the antagonist and the lack of coherence in society. Saki emphasises the horror in the main characters, including both the protagonists and antagonists. â€Å"Conradin† is described as a â€Å"ten years old† boy, skinny and sick who â€Å"will not live for another 5 years†. It is not a nice image for a boy, and it can either cause sympathy or apathy. However, the fact that he has a â€Å"rampant† imagination and he uses it to evade reality, intimidates the reader. The antagonist is Mrs. De Ropp, a high-class elder woman, which is Conradin’s â€Å"guardian and cousin†. Even if she does not admit it â€Å"she disliked Conradin†, which becomes obvious with some actions and details she has with Conradin, such as killing his hen and friend. Sredni Vashtar is a ferret, a God and a religion, all at the same time. It’s difficult for a reader, especially if we took into account the social and religious contex, to not feel uncomfortable or intimidated with/by this character. It symbolises Conradin’s religious fail, it kills Mrs. De Ropp and is described as a fierce beast. Also it has complete control over Conradin, even that it’s not a thinking individual. The maid is the other human character described. She is the contact point with society and ordinary lifestyles, in other words reality. She is described as a clumsy and â€Å"foolish† person, who lacked importance. This shows the author’s and protagonist’s opinion of society. Despite the fact that is not described in detail, the setting has a lot of impact on the reader. First of all, the story is set during fall, the horror season in most cultures. It’s also the time when nature begins to die. The Edwardian mansion is described to have â€Å"many windows†, which commonly in literature symbolise eyes. This creates a feeling of constant vigilance, as if Conradin and the reader could not do anything without Mrs. De Ropp knowing. The lack of detail pushes the reader to use his own imagination to recreate the old Edwardian mansion, which can either create more fear or reduce it, depending on the reader. The â€Å"cheerless† garden with â€Å"few trees† represents Mrs. De Ropp arid personality and decrepit physical appearance, which emphasises the regret and fear felt for the antagonist. The two main places Conradin spends most time on are his room and the toolshed. The first one is described as been â€Å"dark† and the second been at â€Å"dusk†. Light represents hope, so Sredni Vashtar, who lives in the tool shed, also represents hope. The main themes are the children role in the high class society, how the protagonists fails to fulfil them and the consecuences. The reader can easily see the closed social and religious views Saki is trying to criticise: The edwardian high class social standards, based on pride, severe rules and inhuman punishments and the lack of everyday devotion for religion, despite which one. The protagonist contrast and completely break these rules: Conradin hated his cousin, lost and changed his faith, did not had manners and rejected society. As we can observe â€Å"Sredni Vashta† represents divinity/God’s fail, in a social context where religion was extremely strong and important in everyday life; This obviously drags reader’s attention. Saki also explores the importance of a close family, which he lacked because, just as the protagonist, he was raised in Burma by hated relatives. In the story Conradin did not have a close and loving family so become into a troubled kid , with psychological, health and social problems. The language used to describe the protagonist includes a series of techniques Saki uses to emphasise specific characteristics or cause a certain effect on the reader. For example the religious downfall: Saki describes how Conradin thinks â€Å"church service was an alien rite† and instead his god was a ferret. Saki foreshadows Mrs, De Ropp’s death with Conradin’s hen death and with the prayers Conradin says to Sredni Vashtar: â€Å"Do one thing for me, Sredi Vashtar† This makes the readers pay attention to any details and do not loose interest, as well as creating a horror and suspense atmosphere. The contrast between the â€Å"cold afternoon† and the â€Å"warming daylight† is a pathetic fallacy which represents Mrs. De Ropp’s hope fading, anticipating her death. The toast is a symbolism for the pleasure death can cause. This is shown when Mrs. De Ropp tells Conradin about his friend’s death and she offers him a toast, and when Mrs. De Ropp is killed, Conradin prepares himself a toast. The fact that is his favourite meal shows the sick mentality of the character, who celebrates his freedom but also death. Humor, sarcasm and dramatic irony are commonly used by Saki in â€Å"Sredni Vashtar†, which develop a creepiness sensation on the reader. For example the maid says after Mrs. De Ropp’s death â€Å"Whoever will break it to the poor child?†, this dramatic irony is used to emphasise the fact that society did not understood Conradin, and it’s humorous because the maid was described as a stupid character.